7

But Manasa didn’t show up that night either, although Arati on the phone the next morning again refused my plea to go to the police that very afternoon.

‘Arati, it can be as well that Manasa will not come until Ramesh is questioned. Perhaps that is the path she intends for you to take. She is holding open the door that may lead to Tuntuni, and you’re refusing to go through. Will you consider this possibility at least?’

Correctly sensing that she would be aggravated further on this point if we met today, Arati asked if she could take the afternoon off and work on her sewing at home. I agreed, but not before mentioning the English proverb in which God lent a hand to self-helpers (apparently). Then, immediately after hanging up, I called back to insist on one thing: that she wouldn’t return to Vivekananda Road. There were too many dangers — Ramesh might spot her; what if he took off? Or, what if this time she was unable to control her reaction to facing him?

I managed to make Arati promise this much, and said sincerely that I too was waiting for a sign from Manasa. Thankfully, time was on our side: Ramesh would have no idea we were on to him.

Notice, incidentally, how I appear to have fully accepted that it was Ramesh who Arati had shown me, without having any better explanation for it than the grace of Manasa. Just as I had no framework within which to place the undeniable experience of being invisibly propelled along Park Street, except for some vague murmur about skilful hypnosis.

And so this person, who literally didn’t know what to believe in the cases of the last two people who’d approached her for help, got on with the tasks of doing her own dishes for once, and then replying to the letters that would feature in Chandra Sir’s column the following Wednesday.

Sir, I’m a 21-year-old B.Tech student. My girlfriend and I have been going steady for two years, and only recently she has agreed to allow us to express our love for each other more, but within limits. Two days ago, while close to her, I masturbated, then washed my hands with soap, and shortly afterwards digitally penetrated her.

The next morning, which was yesterday, she called me with great anxiety. She had tossed and turned all night, worrying about whether she might have conceived. At first I had no doubt it was safe, but now I feel I should get an objective second opinion. Please, Sir, please advise. My happy love life is under a sudden cloud.

N.M., Behala

#

Sir, exactly five days ago I was walking from school to tuition and I was already late, which was also honestly my fault owing to playing football after school. My tuition Sir does not permit anyone to go to toilet for the full two hours, and I was quite desperate, so I went on the roadside itself. Then I forgot about it and continued on my way to my physics lesson.

From the next day, things began to go badly for everyone in my family. First the doctor said my brother has chicken pox. Then my father fell off his scooter on Wednesday on the bypass close to Science City. He has fractured his arm and cannot go to office. My Thamma is becoming more worried, she has high sugar, Sir, and there is so much pressure on Ma.

Sir, here is my confession. On Thursday, the day after my father’s accident, I bunked school but went to evening tuition at the same Sir’s place for maths instead of physics. My mind was very heavy when I got off the bus, with all the various family problems, and suddenly I realised something terrible. The place where I had stopped to urinate on Monday was the wall of a church which I had not at all noticed. It is a high wall with no chance of seeing the church if you’re standing next to it, but you can see the towers from the other footpath where I was walking this time. Immediately I thought, is God punishing me for my sin outside His house? I would never have done it there if I had known. But now all my relatives are being punished one by one for my offence, and I also fear, my time is coming soon.

Sir, I am not a Christian, but I want to go for confession in a church where no one will know me and also pray for forgiveness. I am fourteen years old and can take the bus or Metro anywhere in the city. I just want to atone for my misdeed and protect my innocent family who don’t even know why these things are happening. Please help with addresses and advice.

I had just forwarded my replies to Chaitali, my editor (‘No, no danger at all from what you’re describing; finger away, young man, you’re making your girlfriend happy’, and, ‘Absolutely no need to visit a church. God will accept a simple prayer of sincere apology made from your bedroom floor, as long as you promise from now on to use public conveniences only’), and was reading an article about young mixed-faith couples being violently harassed in public places — as well as online — by far-right Hindu groups who were intent on stamping out so-called ‘love-jihad’ (the belief that Muslim boys were ‘targeting’ Hindu girls with supposedly sinister demographic objectives), when an email arrived from Shivani. It contained nothing but a link, and for a while I chose to regard it as spam. Then I looked again and clicked warily, hoping I wasn’t fatally corrupting my computer.

It turned out to be just a Times of India story, four paragraphs long. There had been violence in a village in Bardhaman district, about a hundred kilometres from Calcutta, where Hindus and Muslims had clashed because a Hindu boy had been found dead a few days earlier, and the belief grew that he had been punished for his sister’s friendship with a Muslim boy. Three Muslims and another Hindu had since died, including, especially sadly, two brothers of the boy, who was now in hiding. An evening curfew had been imposed on the village, and extra police had been sent from other parts of West Bengal to all likely flashpoints in the district. The final paragraph was a quote from a local opposition leader, alleging another example of a state-wide breakdown of law and order.

Tragic — and depressingly familiar — as this narrative of escalation was, I assumed at first that Shivani had made some kind of mistake. Either she had forwarded the wrong link, or this story was intended for someone else. Neither she nor I had mentioned Bardhaman, or indeed any kind of Hindu–Muslim question, in our few exchanges. Perhaps it was meant for a classmate regarding some school project. I was always double-checking before hitting ‘send’ on emails precisely to avoid this sort of error. Imagine a reply from ‘Chandra Sir’ ending up with Mrs Dhanuka, my principal!

I was still debating how best to reach out to Shivani with a few sympathetic and supportive words when another message arrived, confirming the earlier link must have been an error.

‘I caused that.’