(Recap – In past episodes, I described, how I came in touch with Ganak and then gradually friendly terms developed with him. It helped me to know some interesting incidences of his family members. You know, every man carries so may stories in his life; same was with Ganak. The truth is, a story teller gathers his stuff from people around him only. )
In a sitting with Ganak, when he was alone, meant none of his elder brothers were there, he related about the ‘murder case’ he was booked by the police. As per his version it was a false indictment. Whatever conclusion I drew after listening the entire story was, he was not indicted in an open and shut murder case, rather it was the case for abetting some one to commit the suicide. That is also an another category of heinous offence. In the narration of this story, whatever story he narrated, that majorly revolved around his elder brother Manik. Further, in describing the story, he disparagingly depicted Manik, as his way of talking had ever been. But, it was clear when he despised Manik’s deeds in a way, on the same there reflected the exact human psychology in his narration.
As I have told in previous episodes about the personality of Manik, he was blessed with bright complexion and chiseled features with a tall height. Besides, he was fond to maintain his person regard the dress sense. He ever maintained his hair properly combed, well mannered and talkative he was either. When updated and properly attired he treaded on the road, no one could judge him as a menial laborer by his appearance.This might be accredited to the good breeding cultivated by mother to children up to some extent.
Rest of Ganak’s deportment was concerned, he was some what rebel by nature. Whenever he used to talk about some one, he always mocked at. Though, behind this attitude, his sole purpose was to entertain himself only. It was sort of sadistic bend in his person. The entire description he gave about his falsely being indicted in murder case and his method of narration about that too was a big example of his this mocking tendency. Such kind of contents of story is often uncommon in our “middle class society,” And despite of occurrence of of this kind of heinous offence, they brothers were staying jointly under the same roof, that too was startling to me.
The main reason to stay together might be, the house they were staying in was ancestral and provided the roof to every member of the family. Secondly, all they had accepted the life, ” as it is,” that is called compromising with the circumstances and “be bygone let bygone” type motto they had adopted. But, it’s not easier to forget the past and often on various occasions the bitterness of the past used to surface up. This everlasting bitterness between Ganak and Manik I ever noticed surfacing up intermittently. The phenomenal altercations between brothers which I took as natural sibling rivalry had nothing to do with this. It had another cause. Truly say, for this bitterness I don’t blame his elder brother Manik.
The background history of Manik described by Manik, I am giving a short description of that here,—
In the prime youth, Manik was potentially attractive and handsome in comparison to so many other youths of his age. He was blessed with a gift of being expert in flowery conversation. Whenever, he had no job in hand, he was to pass the quality time in wandering, carousing and enjoying picnicking with friends. Otherwise also, the “stratum of society” they people belonged, they were tend to enjoy the “present time” only. Never they bothered about the tomorrow.
And when you compromised with this kind of situation, it becomes hard to achieve big goal in life. But a fantasy to live a life like well-off gentry, every man fosters in mind. In this drive, such sort of youth opt for the option, he finds fanciful and “easy to go” type. The period of time, Manik was in his prime youth, in our common people’s life, our cine world had great influence. On silver screen, a specific type of love stories used to get portrayed, which generated a toxic kind of impression in the mind of common youth.
Film producers happened to produce this kind of stories, that allured the empty mind of unemployed, poor class people to the utmost. Such Cine- stories were romantic and loaded with a great hit formulae. In these movies, either hero or heroine , meant one party of the main lead roles used to come from a wealthy background and another party from a very poor back ground. Both happened to fall in love for one another. The entire film story was supposed to stretch upon this hit formulae of crisis of ” rich and poor.” Ultimately, with a happy ending both buddies succeeded in becoming husband and wife. This ultimately transforming both the lead characters in the film to live a happy- luxurious life as such.
That was the time, when a majority of populace lived a life ‘at par poverty or below poverty line,’ was to find a solace in such happy ending of the movie. The impact of the movie was, when coming back home after watching the movie, the mind of such movie goer remained heavily captured by the idea to allure some partner, who belonged to at least with a “well- off” back up. Enveloped with the same fancy, Manik too wandered to trap some girl with a strong financial back ground.
When Ganak was describing this plight of Manik to me, occasionally he too was laughing at the petty success of Manik about entangling some good girl. According to Ganak, primary success rate of Manik in trapping the innocent and ignorant girls from ‘well off’ family was superb. But, for how long he could hide his own poor financial back ground. Since, when he used to initiate friendship with the girl, he was to pose himself as a boy from a good family.
In his this drive of “love Mission,” always he had paltry two or three close friends to accommodate him, whom Manik considered as trustworthy one. The main reason was, in our society at that time, people were very offensive towards such type of street romeos, and ever there loomed large the peril of serious type of skirmishes. Hence to ward-off or defend the romeo, some friends were always needed. But another facet of this “love Mission” was, when Manik succeeded at the primary stage in cultivating friendship with some girl, it somewhere offended these friends and they became jealous to him. Manik, not knowing, his friends were snakes in the grass. These friends, always secretively gave the trapped girl the address of the house of the Manik, with a suggestion, ” at least, once you should inquire about the would be “in- laws’ house !”
Here on this point, every love story got spoiled. Either girl by her self would take a pop visit to the house of the Manik or friends of girl, used to glean the the information on this front. And by having a sight of dilapidated, tattered house every girl jibbed like an angry mare and never preferred to look at the face of Manik in future. In the conversation with Ganak about this detailing, I curiously asked, ‘ Then, how Manik managed to get married?” On that, a new story Ganak related. Penned by — Vinay Pharasi —–
