The Lost Daughter of India Read online

  ‘Hanoman is my friend. He knows a lot and he tells me a lot.’

  ‘Hanoman cannot be your friend. Hanoman is only Teacher’s son and you are a prince.’

  ‘No, I’m not. Hanoman says the English conquered the kings and there is no royalty in India any more so I’m not really a prince. And Hanoman has been Outside. He knows about all the things Outside and he tells me.’

  ‘Then I forbid you to talk to Hanoman!’

  ‘You cannot, Daadi! He is my friend, the only friend I have! Hanoman and me, we are like brothers even—’

  ‘You are of royal blood, Kamal! You are a Ksatriya, you cannot be the brother of a teacher’s son.’

  ‘Oh, but I can, we are! He tells me so much and I need to know about everything, about Outside and the silkworms and everything.’

  ‘You do not need to know about the silkworms. That is not your business. They do their work, you do yours – every creature on earth has its allotted place. I have paid servants who care about the silkworms and look after them and make sure they are doing their work. I have servants to collect the silk and turn it into wealth so that you may live like the prince you were born to be. Because one day India will return to her former glory and you will sit in the Surya Hall and rule. It is destiny. Nobody, least of all the English, can outsmart destiny. The Wheel of Time turns slowly but one day she returns to recapture all that was lost; and all that was lost returns to its rightful owner. That is you. That is why I am preserving everything for when that time comes. I am the only one left who believes in the old ways, who knows that the old ways were good and that the old ways must return.

  ‘I am the guardian of your fate, Kamal. Do not sully your mind with matters that do not concern you. You must have the attitude of a king: you must rule, and command, and delegate, and demand obedience. You must show your subordinates that you are their head, that your word is the word of God. And not even Swami Naadiyaananda—’

  She suddenly stopped speaking, and sent him away.

  Kamal was seven when Rani Abishta told him this. His mind was sharp as a razor and picked up details the adults slid over, which is why, at the next opportunity, he had run to Teacher and asked, ‘Teacher, who is Swami Naadiyaananda?’

  Teacher had looked down at him and raised his brows and said, ‘Where did you hear that name?’

  ‘Oh, I just heard someone say it.’

  ‘Well, forget it. It means nothing.’

  His curiosity piqued, Kamal asked others.

  ‘Who is Swami Naadiyaananda?’ he asked his favourite counsellor, Jairam, who only shrugged and raised his shoulders and shook his head. Teacher had smiled secretly and turned away.

  Only Gaindha Dwarka, Rani Abishta’s Chief Counsellor, had hinted at more. ‘You must not speak that name,’ he whispered to Kamal. ‘Never mention it again. It is better for you.’

  ‘But why?’ Kamal insisted.

  Gaindha Dwarka had looked right and left before whispering, ‘He is the one who knows who you really are, and what will become of you if you leave Moti Khodayal. More I cannot say.’ And he had placed a finger on his lips and slid behind the curtain leading to the Indra Hall, and Kamal had never been able to unseal his lips again.

  So Kamal had been left to smoulder, not understanding. All he knew was this: Moti Khodayal was Rani Abishta’s creation, and she had tried to make it perfect, for him. Rani Abishta was queen here; Rani Abishta ruled with an iron hand; Rani Abishta’s word was law. And for some reason known only to herself, Rani Abishta would not allow Kamal, her only grandson, her only relative, the only living human she cared about, to pass beyond those walls. And a mysterious Swami Naadiyaananda had something to do with it. And now he had left the palace without her permission, and there would be trouble.

  So now he knelt in silence before her and watched her and waited for her to speak. She would have him locked in his room for the evening, perhaps. Or for several evenings in a row. It had not been fear of punishment that had kept Kamal from escaping a long time ago, but lack of opportunity: the walls were so high, the sentries so diligent, that it had been near impossible to find a way out. But despite all this, and the inevitable punishment that now awaited him, he would escape again in a heartbeat; he knew that with certainty.

  ‘How did you get out?’ Rani Abishta’s voice was now little more than a whisper, and the lower her voice, the more dangerous her mood. Kamal kept quiet.

  ‘You will not speak? You won’t tell me how you got out? Very well, then I will take my own appropriate measures. Obviously the sentries were negligent. You must have bribed one or other of them – there is no way out without the help of a sentry. If you will not tell me which one then I will have all of them punished. Every one of them.’

  Kamal froze at those words; he had never expected this. His eyes opened wide in horror, for now he understood why her last words had been so soft as to be almost indiscernible, hardly stirring the heavy space between them.

  ‘Tell me.’

  But Kamal could not speak. His tongue seemed stuck to the bottom of his mouth, his jaw locked, and for the first time in his life he knew fear.

  He knew then that he was not invulnerable. He knew that Rani Abishta, with a word, with a nod of her head even, could punish him by punishing others. He knew now that Rani Abishta knew him better than he had assumed; she knew that he cared.

  He had never even tried to hide from her that he cared. Rani Abishta’s instructions, to treat the servants with contempt, he ignored, and blatantly did the opposite: he courted them as his equals. His only friend his own age was Hanoman, who had his own duties to attend to, and so he had found other friends among the servants: Munsami, Gangadin, Ali Yusuf; he knew them all by name. He knew their children’s names, and their children’s ages. He knew when their wives were ailing and the children were sent to an aunt. He knew when an eldest son won a place in a better school, and when a daughter’s betrothal turned a father’s hair grey. It was easy to make friends with the servants, for Rani Abishta was immobile and her eyes could not see around corners. Confined as she was to the Surya Hall, what did it matter what she ordered? True, she had her spies. Kamal knew whom he could trust, and whom not.

  Soondath was a snake, and Ramsaywack was a rat. They and their underdogs: Kamal avoided them; those were the ones sent to catch him when he disappeared, who clawed his upper arm and dragged him through the corridors and into Rani Abishta’s presence, where they immediately turned slimy as snails and released their grip – for Kamal was not to be hurt – and pasted simpering smirks of deference on their faces. They were the ones who would betray him in the wink of an eye, whenever there was something to betray. But up to now there had been no transgression so serious that the blame could be placed on anyone but himself. Up to now it had been fun and games: a little boy being a boy. But now, since he’d left the palace, things were different…

  Kamal knew that servants who transgressed were whipped. He knew, but avoided the matter neatly by making himself absent during such times, removing himself to the farthest point of the Surya Hall. Once he had seen a fellow afterwards, bent and broken, dragged across the courtyard, the gates flung open and the man kicked out, never to be seen again. Kamal had turned and fled and pushed the incident to the back of his mind. Today there was no avoidance. Kamal was made to sit beside his grandmother as one by one the guards were brought forward, stripped to the waist, flogged across the backs until they were unable to stand, and booted out of the presence.

  Kamal tried to plead with Rani Abishta. He begged and coaxed and swore on his life that not one of them had helped him escape. He told her the whole story of his escape, in all its details; he beseeched her not to hurt the guards, to whip him instead, for he was at fault and no one else. He wept his apologies; he knelt before her imploring her to accept his remorse; he promised on his life never to do it again: all to no avail.

  Rani Abishta made Soondath and Ramsaywack hold Kamal, one on each side, and though he writhed and wrig
gled he could not escape their iron grip. Soondath grasped him under his chin and held it up so he was forced to watch, and he cried aloud and squeezed his eyes shut but the tears escaped and flowed down his cheeks, and still he could hear the buzz of the whip as it slashed the air and the dull thwack as it cut across a bare back, and the agonised cries of the guards. He heard them beg for mercy and he recognised their voices: Mahadai and Challu and Basdeo were among them, men who had smiled and joked and laughed with him, men who were his friends, and punished without guilt for his foolishness.

  Even before it was over Kamal fainted, for he could not bear the pain; it was as if every whiplash landed on his own back. His cries were louder than those of the guards, for he cried not only for them but for the girl in the street of women, and Ramsaywack tied a cloth through his mouth to gag him. That was when he mercifully fainted.

  When he came to, he found himself lying on the carpet at Rani Abishta’s feet, the hall emptied except for Hiraman, sitting naked to the waist in a far corner and playing on his tabla. The hollow rattling of the tabla had replaced the screams. A soft tranquillity now filled the hall, the reverent hush that heralded the evening.

  Rani Abishta sat in her usual position, eating. At first Kamal simply watched her out of half-closed eyes, without moving, and knew that she watched him too. He moved then, and so did she, signalling for Hiraman to leave.

  When they were alone, Rani Abishta gestured for him to come nearer.

  ‘The next time the punishment will be worse,’ said Rani Abishta. ‘So I am hoping for your peace of mind there will not be a next time. I have not dismissed those guards. They have been returned to their positions with their backs stinging and bleeding, and now they will be more vigilant than ever.’

  Kamal never tried to go Outside again. He accepted his confinement, knowing that one day it would come to an end. Somehow, he no longer minded. Outside, he knew now, was too much for him to bear.

  Chapter 7

  Caroline. Cambridge, Mass., 1982–1985

  As Caroline grew into womanhood her childish dreams faded, along with the comforting memory of soft-bosomed Meena with her never-ending tales of swarthy kings and queens and the eternal battle between Good and Evil. Swept up in the dramas and emotional roller-coaster rides that greet every American girl on entering her teens, Caroline learned that the world stood open to her; that she already was a princess of sorts. Indulged by wealthy parents, spoiled by older brothers, folded in the safe and cosy arms of Cambridge high society, she wanted for nothing. She dated boys, fell in and out of love, dressed up for Halloween parties. Visits with Grandma and Grandpa Mitchell on Cape Cod, family gatherings around the Christmas table, weddings and christenings, vacations in the Caribbean, trips down to Florida every now and then to see Great-Aunt Janey: that was Caroline’s life, and she loved it.

  Yet as the years passed something happened, something changed. It started with a boyfriend, Samuel, who didn’t quite pass muster with her parents: Sam had an untidy beard and he came from less than prime stock. She was seventeen when she met him, he nineteen, in his first year at college, and not at Harvard either, but at Boston U, and studying politics; and his parents were one-time hippies. He had been born on a farm in Ecuador while his father was on the run from the Vietnam draft, had grown up on a series of alternative-lifestyle farms and communes in South America and, later, in Vermont, California and Arizona. She liked him a lot; she didn’t love him. But she loved his mind. Sam put new, revolutionary ideas into her head.

  Sam told her about the world Out There: about the Amazonian Indians whose habitat was being eroded by greedy corporations tearing down the rainforest. He told her about the rape of Africa: about apartheid. He opened her eyes to the plight of blacks on their own continent; right next door, in fact, in Boston’s South End and Roxbury. About the Boston busing crisis of 1974, about racism and oppression and crime caused by poverty and lack of opportunity.

  ‘You’re a white princess,’ Sam scoffed, ‘living in dreamland in your pretty Queen Anne mansion!’ He made her feel guilty; it was a good and healthy feeling, so she listened. Feeling guilty made her feel, incongruously, noble.

  He told her about the oppression of women in the Middle East, and Pakistan, and India—

  ‘India!’ interrupted Caroline. ‘I used to have an Indian nanny – Meena was her name. She practically raised me when I was a little girl – like a second mother. Oh, I loved her so much! I love India so much! It’s so romantic!’

  ‘India, romantic?’ scoffed Sam. ‘I’ve been to India. My parents took me when I was just a kid. They took me along the Hippie Trail: through Europe and Turkey and Iran, Afghanistan, Nepal. We lived in India for a year. India is a basket case, Caroline. Millions of people in abject poverty, hardly scraping together enough to survive. They are exploited and downtrodden. The women are nothing but chattels. India is anything but romantic.’

  And so Sam opened her eyes to the misery of millions, billions of human beings who shared the planet with her, but did not have the almost random – it seemed to her – good fortune of being born to privileged white parents in America. Caroline began to think, to explore. And even when the relationship with Sam broke down – deep down, he resented her privilege, and mocked it just a little too much – she continued on the trajectory he had launched her on.

  The seed Meena had planted so long ago, hidden in the depths of Caroline’s soul, stirred, and yearned for nourishment. India called. And though she was not ready to go there yet, she decided to flout her parents’ will and, instead of studying law at Harvard so as to join her father in his practice, or becoming a doctor like her mother, Caroline chose a different path altogether: anthropology, at Boston University, specialising in South Indian tribes and family structure. Because India still fascinated her. One day, she swore to herself, I will go there and see for myself.

  Chapter 8

  Asha, 2000

  Paruthy Uncle was a schoolteacher, just like Appa, but that was where the similarity between them ended, because Appa’s brother was not kind but very cruel. That’s how it seemed to me, anyway. Paruthy Uncle lived on the other side of Gingee. His was a much smaller house than ours, and we could not possibly all move there, so that is why he brought his whole family and moved into our big house. He did that the day after Amma and Appa died, because there were children in the house he had to look after. Even though my big brothers were looking after us quite well and said they could carry on doing so.

  I think he would have liked the house very much if it weren’t for its contents, which were us; but he had to take both the house and its contents. I think there was some law about that, or some duty he had to fulfil towards his brother. So now we all lived together with Paruthy Uncle, Paruthy Uncle’s wife, Udhaya Aunty, Paruthy Uncle’s three daughters and Paruthy Uncle’s old mother. And all of a sudden our big house seemed much smaller, though it was the same size, just much fuller now, especially because Paruthy Uncle’s three daughters were all quite young and very noisy and took up a lot of space for themselves. In fact, Paruthy Uncle and his family took over most of the house for themselves, and left the five of us – four brothers and me – to live all in one room, all together.

  I never liked Paruthy Uncle. Not even before all the terrible things happened I’m going to tell you about. I suppose that’s only natural, because he also did not like me. He didn’t like any of us but he didn’t like me most of all, because he said I was an extra mouth to feed, and not his flesh and blood, and a useless girl, and such things. There was a lot of talk about money in those days, but I didn’t understand it. How could I? I was so innocent. Only now I understand the meaning of money, and how a human life and human happiness weigh nothing against money. I only remember things that were repeated often, like the two words ‘ten mouths’, which seemed to my eleven-year-old mind to be the axis upon which our whole life turned: ‘ten mouths to feed,’ Paruthy Uncle would complain all of the time.

  ‘I have to cook for
ten mouths!’ Udhaya Aunty nagged. Or almost as often as the ‘ten mouths’ there were the ‘five extra mouths’, meaning us: my four brothers and me. Janiki and my eldest brother Rohan had moved out by now; Janiki lived in America and Rohan was studying in Madras. So that left four brothers and me as the five extra mouths. I even used to dream about those five extra mouths, gaping open and floating by without heads and bodies while Udhaya Aunty placed a tiny spoonful of food in each one, after which the mouth would snap shut. That is what we were for them: open mouths they were supposed to fill.

  Janiki flew back from America the moment she heard of the accident and stayed for a week. She was very angry when she saw that we were all in one room, and they lived in all the other rooms, each daughter with her own room. I didn’t really listen to all the quarrels on the matter; all I remember is that Janiki was both angry and sad, sometimes weeping, and often when we were supposed to be asleep I would hear her shouting at Uncle and Aunty, and they shouting back. And Janiki took me in her arms often and held me close and wept, but still I did not know what was going to happen.

  ‘You must write to her parents! Give me their addresses and I will write them! Let her go to them at least!’

  And my heart raced and I grew excited, because it sounded as if Janiki was trying to get me away from Aunty and Uncle, who hated me the most of all of us, and sometimes struck me if I was bad. They said I was only a girl. The boys were useful because they had no sons of their own and one day the boys would look after them, when they were old. But a girl is only a burden and how would they ever find a husband for me? If I had had even an inkling of what was to come, you can be sure I would have run away, though where could I have gone, eleven years of age and no knowledge of the world? That was when I wrote letters to Mom in America and Daddy in Dubai, and gave Paruthy Uncle the letters to post, but they never came for me. While I was waiting for them to reply, though, Janiki said I should move out and live somewhere else. So Janiki tried to rescue me.