“During days of
emergency”, my maternal grandmother had once said to me “your mother had become
a firebrand in her college. She used to address large number of students
outside her college about the ills of emergency. A rebel she was then”. I loved
this narration of my mother. I had heard this many a times from my granny.
Every time I portrayed my mother in my mind as a young and courageous rebel
girl, firmly standing with her chin up, shouting aloud from atop a truck, refusing to cow down
against anyone.
This very image had
come once again vividly before my eyes on the day her husband died. With all
courage and might she pulled her chin up against the tyranny of life. She
refused to be cow down, again.
A month earlier our
parents celebrated their 25th anniversary. About a month later her
life’s companion had parted ways forever. The road of life has its unexpected
bends and my mother happened to negotiate the sharpest and the toughest turn of
her life on that bright summer day. My brother, sister and I were about to
reach Dhanbad, from Delhi, where we pursued our graduation. My mother was
preparing breakfast for all of us. My father was ecstatic with the prospect of a
family reunion. He was washing his car when he suffered a terrible heart
attack. In a minute he felled down as my mother rushed to hold him affirm. She
and a maid held him firmly as she shouted for help. A neighbour arranged a car
and holding his head on her lap she took him to a hospital only to find that the
past few minutes that she spent with him were the last few minutes that they
spent together. She had already lost him. The news was broken to her by my
brother, after we reached the hospital an hour later. In my entire life that
was the only day I saw her crying. She had seen enough struggles before and she
would see many struggles after, but never ever I saw the lady shed a tear
again. But that day when the dearest person to her was gone forever, she cried.
She cried till she realised that we would need her all the more now. So she sat
there on a bench, held three of us close to her, calming us, caressing us, protecting
us, assuring us in quivering yet firm voice that all will be good, that she
will be our father henceforth and sobbing incessantly for the largest void
created in her life, that will never ever be filled again. Against the life’s
plan for devastation, on that fateful day, she showed defiance. Amidst sea of
sorrow on that day she chose happiness for us.
