Hanumanthi is Dead

Hanumanthi is dead. The child that she carried safe in her womb is dead. Two deaths in one. A million deaths until the fatal blow dug her into the earth. That was not enough. To be sure she would not wakeup, she was dragged and thrown into the river. Hoping she would sail, set float and eventually sink. Her five month little child curled in the protective dark of her womb.


Hanumanthi is dead. Her mother Mallama does not know what her heart thinks. Her three little children are oblivion to the gathering of neighbours outside their hut. They whisper in hushed monologues. The moon has not shone today. It is amavasya. The kerosene lamps merely light the threshold of the hut. The night of amavasya is the darkest. Dark is the fear of death. Dark are the rituals performed to appease the gods on the night of amavasya. They wait for the dark night to pass. It does not. It gets darker, more intense, more forlorn, more certain.


Hanumanthi will not return. Perhaps she will. Her mother needs her. Her children need her. Her three unmarried sisters need her. A lot is depended on her return. And return she will. She has never been away from home for so many days. She left home on the moonless night. It is six days since she left home, to go with Eerappa. They wait for the moonless night to pass. Hanumanthi’s mother Mallamma walks to Eerappa’s house that stands at the end of the village. She stands outside Eerappa house with folded hands. She is worried for her pregnant child. He tells her he does not know where she is. He had taken her to the construction site for manual work and after the day’s work, had dropped her back to the village. She had walked her way home.


Hanumanthi has not returned. Bheemesh, her three-year-old son has been waiting at the mat door for six days now. He stops playing as his older brother Sharna Basawa, who is five, looks keenly at his grandmother as she walks in after a long days work. Hanumanthi’s eldest child Ulugappa is seven. He knows nothing. Since the time of his birth, he has lived a vegetated condition and lies in a corner. Mallamma says nothing. She puts down the lunch box that she has carried on her head and sits down at the threshold. She waits. Evening is the time for her to wait into the dark. Mornings are spent cooking for the family and setting out to cultivate paddy in the landlord’s fields. She needs her daily wages. These past days have been like the day before. The night gets longer and when you think the wait is finally over, with the sun out on the horizon, there is no sign of Hanumanthi’s arrival.


Hanumanthi is dead. She has lived many deaths. This is just a physical exit from this world. Mallamma’s first-born Hanumanthi has been the main breadwinner since a tender age. Now that Mallamma is old, the only way of earning a living is to work in the fields of rich land owners. Work is available for four months during the monsoons. Hanumanthi would work at construction sites carrying gravel and stones. She was of support to her own children, her unmarried sisters and an ageing mother. If she does not return, who will then run the family?

---

Mallamma the mother of Hanumanthi, bore her baby girl soon after she was ordained a Devdasi. She became the Dasi or slave to god. The godly priest at the temple was the first to take Mallamma body. You need to touch and bless the offering. Then followed the god’s upper cast men, who feel, fuck, molest, screw, abuse, discard and fuck again. Mallamma, had just “grown up”. When a girl attains puberty, the time is right to make the offering to the goddess. An age-old tradition continues. Puberty strikes unaware, making way for men to have their want. Thus was born Hanumanthi.


Hanumanthi born to the offered mother grew up to see men come home at nightfall and slip by twilight. She knew her mother had no husband and she no father to call. She knew the sisters who came later, came through the men who visited her mother. She knew she was the first-born and that when puberty strikes, like it did her mother, her mother’s mother, she too will be taken to the temple where the large, fierce eyes of Yellama will smile on her.

---

Yellama the goddess smiles at the slaves under her feet. Yellama the goddess is appeased through human sacrifice. Yellama the goddess bears witness to the thousands of young girls who come to her. They walk to the temple. Naked. Covered in vermillion. Hair let loose on drooping shoulders cover delicate breasts. Clinching Neem leaves that shade the shame of the vagina.


Yellama, the beheaded goddess. From her womb was born Parashurama. Parashurama the incarnate of Vishnu. Parashurama, the valiant, the brave, brahmaskatrtriya. Parashurama the youngest son of Yellama, who follows the orders from his father Jamadagni to behead his mother. The youngest, the dearest son, who without a thought snatches the machete from his fainthearted brothers to strike. The valiant one, who cannot allow his father go back on his words, thus must strike his mother into two. She falls into two.


Earlier, Yellama, had walked to the pond to fetch water for her husband’s morning religious ritual. She sees young boys playing in the pond, watching them in their playful glee. She must return, but she lingers at the pond a little while longer, smiling at the laughter, playful chatter of young boys. She momentarily loses herself at the sheer pleasure of youthful freedom. Knowing her husband is waiting, she rushes back home with the pitcher of water. She is late. She knows the wrath of her husband, whose anger cannot be contained. Her distraction is a crime that befalls a fitting punishment. The offerings to the gods are of no significance now, than venting out the anger for the holy man. Parashurama is the only one who will abide. He acts to his father’s anger.

---

Yellama the protector of Hanumanthi is worshiped with human offerings. Yet, Hanumanthi is dead. Hanumanthi the devdasi is now thirty years old. She bore four children from Nayak who would visit her often. He would come reeking of toddy, fall on her, finish his act, and when leaving would leave some money by the bed. He was the only one frequenting her. She was lucky for at least having to offer herself to just one. Having continued the tradition of her mother, the other sisters were saved. They could be married off.


The drunkenness of Nayak was intolerable. She could have foul mouth breathing on her every time he was on top of her. She detested it, that one day she insisted that he stop visiting her home. He stopped.


Then came Eerappa. She worked at the construction place, where Eerappa was a mason. She has known him for a little over six months now. Suffice to know that is an upper cast man. A native of Bijapur , living with his sister.


He has replaced Nayak. The loose money and a few coins are thrown on the bed before he leaves. She is pregnant with his child. Eerappa would call her to work on the construction sites where he worked. She would go. A woman’s mind searchers for love and the desire to care for her man can sometimes kill. She would carry food for both. He would then visit her a few times in the week. In the night, he asked her to accompany him to the construction site.

---

The day is Amavasya. Hanumanthi has to clean and perform the ablutions to pray to Yellama. Her heart is where Eerappa is. She must not go, for she knows her child in her womb has been kicking her hard, almost telling her she must not step outside the moonless night. She rubs her swollen stomach. She listens to her baby. Not for long. Eerappa calls on her cell phone, prodding her to come. The baby kicks. It is afternoon. Hanumanthi listens to her heart. She packs her lunch box for two, tells her kids that she will be back soon and leaves.

---

Hanumanthi is dead. Her body is recovered from the river that flows next to a shrine of Yellama. She is dragged out of the body that is disintegrating. It is nearing nightfall. Her children do not know that she is found. Her face is disfigured and dark as nightfall. The river has ripped off her skin off. Eerappa watches remorselessly as she is fetched out of the water. Eerappa has only this much to say: “I brought her to the temple to pray. She asked me for money and I could not spare more than 200 rupees. She would not let go of me. I struck her and she fell. I took her to the river to put some water into her mouth. She was dead. I let her be.”

---

Mallama knows her wait has ended. She knows that there is more to the faint explanation of Hanumanthi ‘s death. She knows in the deep of her mind, that Eerappa has sacrificed her daughter and the unborn child to appease the gods. When the blood of cattle is not enough to satiate the thirst of the displeased deity, you need a woman’s blood. The sinister sacrifices made in the dark of the moonless night removes the ills at construction sites. This thought will haunt Mallama for the rest of her waking time. A devdasi’s body and blood is easy and cheap. Eerappa had once before offered sacrifices of cows to wade off evil. May be he wanted something more to give as offering. She had tried to tell her daughter not to step out of the house on amavasya. It was not good for the unborn child. Hanumanthi did not listen. Why then would he take her to the temple far away from her village to pray? Why then was she struck to her head on a moonless night? Why then did he remain peaceful for all these days? Why then did he continue to work at the construction site, fixing brick over brick? Why then did Hanumanthi not listen to the kicking of the child in her womb?

~~~*~~~

OUR Dying CHILDREN: Where is the RIGHT to LIFE?

“No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law”, reads Article 21 of the Indian constitution. Does “life” mean a mere mode of existence - an existence from birth to the natural decay of the body to death? Or does “life” mean living, breathing, existing through the means to subsist with the dignity of being, possessing the right to livelihood, health, to be treated equal of any physical and sexual identity, of caste and creed.

Then, what may you define “deprived”? Simply put, it means snatching, taking away, stripping, impoverished, keeping away from having the fundamental essence of life.

When things being equal, does this include children? Is this merely a presumption that it does, after all?

Children are the silent, the invisible, possessing no formal political voice to claim their identity to the “right to life”. If we are the custodians of their lives, then, why is it that India allows two million of her children under the age of five to die every year, through a deathblow of malnutrition, when it is clearly preventable and manageable?

Undernutrition is a violation of child right and right to life. A child’s right to food is an integral part of the right to life.

India has the dubious distinction of standing first in having the highest number of stunted children in the world, surpassing countries like Bangladesh, Nepal, Ethiopia and several Sub-Saharan African countries. Low height for age is indicative of stunting and of chronic malnutrition. The prevalence of underweight children in India is twice as high as the average prevalence of 26 sub-Saharan African countries put together. In India, the under five-mortality death was reported to be alarmingly high at 69 for every 1,000 live births in 2008. Five north Indian states: Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh account for nearly 55 percent of child mortality and with this, 65 percent of maternal deaths.

More than 19 million infants in the developing world have low birth weight. More than half are in South Asia; 8.3 million are in India

The Game of Survival for the Hungry Children

The health and nutritional status of India’s children has been in the danger zone for far too long. According to the National Family Health Survey (NFHS-3) 2005- 06, 48 percent or half of the India’s children under the age of five are chronically malnourished or stunted, with nearly 43 percent children underweight or have low weight for their age. This puts the survival of a child at grave risk, apart from having the potential to cause severe physical, intellectual and cognitive development that can cripple the child for life.

Research has proved that ensuring better childhood nutrition increases the adult productivity, thus enhancing the economic wellbeing of the individual, thereby ending the vicious cycle that poverty begets hunger.

The world looses 9 million children under the age of 5 each year, with two million children dying in India alone. Two thirds of these deaths are preventable: diarrhoea, pneumonia, malaria, measles, and HIV and AIDS account for nearly half the deaths. Undernutrition contributes to more than one third of these deaths.

Adequate food, care and attention health go a long way in protecting the child from diseases.

The colossal waste of fragile life is compounded by poverty, poor maternal nutrition, non-literacy, prevalent social norms, sanitation, and safe water supply. Truncated government policies, rising food prices, challenges in food production, high import of pulses, inadequate budgetary allocation on health further accentuate the problem, deteriorating the health and wellbeing of the vulnerable sections of the society. The mother and child are the vulnerable most. As you read this, children continue to die silently. The nutrition security of the country is seldom addressed with the seriousness it deserves.

Take the fallout of malnourishment – Anaemia. Anaemia is a deficiency of haemoglobin or red blood cells causing far-reaching damage on an individual. In young children, it results in increased susceptibility to infectious diseases, impairment in coordination, cognitive performance, behavioural development, language development, and scholastic achievement.

Anaemia in children under three years of age has increased to a far greater level from 74 percent to 79 percent in 2005-06 of NFHS-3. A mild decrease in severe anaemia is seen from 5 percent to 4 percent. Children (under three years) with low weight for height or wasted, has increased from 20 percent to 23 percent from NFHS-2 to NFHS-3, through there has been improvement in children with Stunting or low height for age.

Today, the prevalence of anaemia among married women between 15 to 49 years has risen from 52 percent (1998-99) to 56 per cent in 2005-06. 58 per cent of pregnant women suffer from anaemia.

A Healthy Mother, A Healthy Child

It is beyond any doubt that a healthy mother is unlikely to have a stunted, wasted or an underweight child. Anaemic and under-nourishment has a severe impact in pregnancy, the development of the fatuous and the newborn child, making it impossible for the mother to support the nutrition deficit of the child. It is found that mothers who have a body mass index less than 18.5 kg/m2 or underweight are likely to have undernourished children. This threatening the survival of the mother and child.

Hunger, Food and Nutrition Security

It must be noted that despite the tall claims of the green revolution and the surplus of food grain production having increased from 50.82 in 1950-51 to 200.88 million tonnes in 1998-99, the production of coarse grain and pulse has not increased. The government today imports large scale of pulses, making it unaffordable for the poor.

Thus, there is a dramatic decline in the per capita consumption of the essential pulses (the vital protein element) to merely 34 grams per day. The government is unable to fill the crevice of cost, availability, distribution and fiscal expenditure.

The nutritionally vulnerable child, adolescent girl, expecting and lactating mothers face the brunt of the nutrition crisis and ill health the most. The public distribution system (PDS) do not distribute pulses, oil, locally available coarse grain to the poor margins of society who access the PDS. If measures are taken to encourage the consumption, cultivation of course grain and pulses, then this can fill the nutritional gap of a household.

Who Are the Children that Suffer the Most?

As gruesome as this may be, it is important to delve into the plight of tribal and dalith children. They are caught in the quagmire of social inequality, political alienation, discrimination and exclusion. Consider this: the neonatal mortality of the Scheduled Tribe (ST) and Scheduled Caste (SC) is far greater at 46.3 to 34.5 among non ST/SC/OBC. Infant mortality rate is 66.4 in ST/SC to 48.9 among others. This only proves that the nutritional deficiencies are at a heightened state among disadvantaged groups. Young children from the disadvantaged castes are more susceptible to a chronic stunted, wasted, and underweight nutritional status than children from other “upward” castes. This shows that the accessibility to health care, clean drinking water, access to education, landlessness, migration and insurmountable poverty are factors that cripple the normal development of a child that belongs to the “other” side of the caste barrier.

Little Done is Half Done

Over the past few years, several attempts have been made to plug the dismal health record of mother and child in the country with the introduction of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) and Mid Day Meal Scheme. The ICDS address the nutritional status of children under six years, lactating mothers and adolescent girls (only two adolescent girls per angawadi). The Mid Day Meal tackles the nutritional flux and classroom hunger of children from 6 to 14 years.

Though much is done, much remains to be achieved. The out-reach of the ICDS centres or Aganwadis fall short in its coverage. Only 30 percent of children from 6 months to 6 years have access to an anganwadi. This means that over 80 percent the children of this age group have no access to any day-care centres. The universalization of the ICDS is far from being a dream. The Supreme Court had earlier ordered the opening of 14 lack aganwadi centres with specific coverage given to SC/ST, urban slums, and other disadvantaged habitations.

Promise to Create a World Fit for Children

There lies promise in the impact of the health and nutrition interventions made in the past eight to nine years. Clearly, there is a decline in infant mortality and severe malnutrition.

However, even with more than 10 lack operational aganwadis, the functioning of the aganwadis needs systemic support to ensure its true efficacy. The need to upgrade the day care to anganwadi- cum-crèches would be the lifeline to working mothers (mostly from the unorganized sectors) who can leave their children behind in the day-care centre, while they earn their bread.

Taking heed to the Supreme Court intervention at the colossal rotting of food grain, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government has finally made a decision to reach PDSs in 150 districts in the neglected -rural -poverty-belt of Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Assam, eastern Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) has helped in strengthening the public health systems through the induction of the grass root workers like the Auxiliary Nurse Midwife (ANM) and Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA). Today they play a pivotal role in ensuring that maternal and infant mortality is checked by encouraging institutional delivery, counselling and support on breastfeeding practises, guidance on maternal and child health, information dissemination on maternity entailments among other things.

Our Tomorrow

We have a promise to keep: to save our children from the perils of hunger, starvation, malnourishment and death. We owe it to every child that we will create an environment that is equal, fair and just, where a child is nurtured to grow to his/her full potential. This world belongs to them, despite their silence. They have a right to the earth beneath, the sky above, the wind and water around them. If we cannot do everything in our power to lessen the burden on their delicate lives, we would have done a disfavour to ourselves.

~~~*~~~

Meeting after Lifetimes

Don't be dismayed at good-byes. A farewell is necessary before you can meet again.  And meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends" - Richard Bach

~~~*~~~

Nostalgia is like dusting an old forgotten book found accidently in the attic. You drop everything else, and pick up the book. As you skim through the book, You observe that the book has dog-ears. A silverfish tries to run for its survival. Despite the dust causing an irritation to your throat, you smile. The smile lasts longer, as you drift into a past – the past that is hazy, where the smaller details have faded away as events have filled the past. The past is of a distant world. You do not know if the transported memory of an old world is fiction anymore or factual incidents. It is blur as an old photograph.

 You try to retrieve as much as you can, catching yourself smiling longer. The past and the present suddenly turn into a unique moment of stillness. You push the uncomfortable obstacles in the attic and plonk down for a little longer. The dust and gloom is hardly claustrophobic. You flip through the pages of life. You find a bookmark with a heightened emotional message written on it. You smile and vision how much things have changed from then. How silly the emotional uttering’s are. Today you have turned to be more measured, weighing every word you utter. You look at those silly, queer moments, through the eyes of a stiff, careful, calculated, educated and refined intellect. It beats you that there was a silly child with a free and often wild spirit. The spirit is gone. It’s only in the remembrance of it all that it is alive.

Meeting friends after lifetimes is indeed certain with friends...a hope I have carried into dusty attics. Friends have come alive through the pages of childhood after 15 years, even 25 years hence. The spirits of the “then”, the childlike signature giggles, the funny mannerisms that you had as a child, has uncomfortably become stronger. 

There is a beauty in the unsaid. Oftentimes life has no explanation to things – and things are better left unsaid. The “why” of life need no logical explanation that education has anyway spoilt us with. Why did Hail not stop to write to as many 10 Lavanyas' to see if that ONE was after all her friend she had lost. Her persistence in writing emails with the hope that one email will come back to her with the affirmation that a dull mortal will be found in the midst of a 100 million people! And, above all she would find me in the same way her memory had pictured me. Why? Why me?

I was an ordinary girl, sitting in the sides of my class. Left alone. Introverted. Quiet. Hardly naughty. And yet, why?

“oh my gosh... i can't believe i managed to find u, do u remember who the hell i am... how r u, ur parents and bros.... its ages.... lost contact after u'll left goa.... reply soon”

I was elated! I still am, because I found my past, in its most beautiful manner. I am richer through the revival.

The impatient excitement to get the affirmation is seen in the desperation to hear: '' yes! You have found me! It is the same Lavanya you are looking for!” Is it the same Lav? I wonder.

“i checked a couple of times yesterday to c if there was a reply from u but then thought it being a sunday u might be snoozing away to glory... yes... now goa is just memories as v too finished up with goa, we sold our place 4 yrs back and mom and dad moved back to cochin as dad and mom were not keeping too well... Lavanya, it feels like i am dreaming, i can't believe i got in touch with u.... how can i not keep in touch with u after trying to find u for so long..... fill me with all the news of the last 25 yrs hehehhehehehe.... i want to chat soooooooooooooonnnnnnnnn”

How can this happen? Would I let down my hair and be a wild-child again, caught in the momentary excitement and scream with joy! Or just be measured, with a polite response of sweet nothing, that ends with any possibility of communicating further? The latter did not happen here. Hail flew down to meet me – when she was heading out to relocate to a foreign land. We meet. Give big-booby hugs. Giggle like how we did when crossing the river to school, realising that our panties would get wet with the high-tide, and we cannot lift our skirts anymore!

And then Abi. I could not recollect her, until I dug-up the faded school picture. I hesitantly put my finger and guess it must be she! She wrote to me “One thing i remember is your khaki coloured school bag” she later told me that she remembered my smile, and that it looks like it is intact now too! It brought back a flood of nostalgia. I promptly wrote to her: “Yeah, now that you remind me of my Khaki bag, i think those days you would get Duck Bags! and the selza ink pens, where students would be more interested in turning the nob at the end of the pen and exchanging ink! U do remember my sense of "humour" - i remember nothing of it! guess it has all evaporated!!! its dry now!”

The khaki bag was probably what my parents could afford then. A bag that would be able to hold the weight of books for at least a couple of years...and the ink bottles that would be enough to fill the pens of my siblings and last longer than a ball-point pens that you get these days. The discarding culture of pens along with other things in life, is what we have learnt to do without a though,  when the ink goes dry!

Then, again, a miracle that seldom occurs thrice in a lifetime – another friend's desperate search finds me to her! Shaz, after many years of searching, going to places where I could be found, realized that I had moved away from the sleepy town of Mangalore. I no longer lived there. A girl who wanted to keep the promise of unfailing closeness. She wrote a letter in blood that that I will remain her best friend for life. There was no telephone then, and the blue inland letter with the stamp of Gandhi was a promissory note. I remember feeling shocked, and unsure if I needed to respond to the letter in an equally dramatic fashion of writing a “love” letter in my blood! One would need a spoon full of blood to dip and write!

I see a simple message in my inbox “hi Lavanya am shaz ur old frnd,hw r u doing n where r u ???”

We have spoken to each other a couple of times. She lives in a distant country. We have talked about the little crushes we had, the pranks we played on friends, sitting under gulmohar trees in the school veranda and talking about this and that, and doing girly things together – of great importance. Shopping for the holders of “maturity” – BRA!

Having no clue of the intricate details that goes into selecting the upholders of life, the size, the deign ...all we would have seen were the bras our mother hung out on the clothesline, or a sister’s or a distant aunt’s perhaps. You knew you would never want to get into such HUGE nets of support! Very sheepishly telling the shopkeeper that we are there to buy, hmm, the word just not coming out of our otherwise strong, booming voice box! The embarrassing looks on our faces when the shopkeeper asked rather crudely “what size?” You are stumped. You would want to bury yourself into the earth! You think he would know and just pack what will fit without a fuss.

But no! He picks up boxes after boxes, showing the variety that are displayed in an “on-your-face” manner. How on earth do you know the equations of measurements? What does A, B, C and D mean? 20, 21, 24 all seems just the same. “Mom did not educate us on this – I am sure she does not even know if we need one!” The peer pressure to wear a bra was not really uttered by the girls in class. I realize the quite endurance of unspeakable stress comes through with growing. Anatomical change being one in equal order!

Nostalgia lives on. Goodbye merely means “until we meet again”, and friends are the miracle of life that show you have much you have grown. Or rather, how much of the child you left behind IS with you.

~~~*~~~

A Note to a Dear Friend

I received a note from a friend that says: Thanks a ton...for being in my life...u r precious. Luv Ambily


An affirmation to you my dear Ambily:

To you my friend
A witness of sudden silence
Tearing eyes
Of holding in arms my one.

To my friend
A witness of promise
Lay shattered
Like the grass scattered on granite floor

To my friend
Who walks through the scatter
Of glass pieces that shine the sun above
Letting the hair ruffle through

To my friend
Who comes home
To be in the arms of the one
Who is not home. Yet.

Not home here – a physical structure
But home to the heart
That aches for oneness
As I stretch my arms to reach the sky. Reach.

To smile through my pulsating heart
To hear your soft whisper
To smile again for nothing
To dream through misty eyes

To know, my one is but one
To let that one remain
In the wind of memory sweet
Allow nostalgia linger on the couch

To my friend
For all that is known
Sharing lives miracle of birth and death and birth again
Of living renewed, gathering the wonder of life.

Dearest,
You are part of my shrunken world - a world that has very few people in it, who live through my memory every day. You have been, for you know, that I have always thought of you to be a wonderful human being, who reflects love, joy, smile and will to live through the world's most difficult processes of life, giving, knowing, sharing and above all acknowledging.

The cycles of life and death, the toils of aches, pains, possessiveness and yet the wonder of sharing, loving, bestowing loving kindness to all around us is the grand wonder of the human mind – to expand our mind to the world, such that we embrace it in its beauty. In such a beautiful world – you are my miracle. Smile for the person that you are.

As much as I would love to speak to you often, I do know I converse with you, through the heart that speaks the unsaid. You remain in my mind, my heart and my soul, often to tell you that I am with you. Always.


Lavanya

~~~*~~~