Suman Kalyan Adhikari
It’s a rural farmland in the hills. Some of hills are large enough to be called mountains. There is only one road leading to it and a small interstate highway slices through, intersecting the highway gouge through the village side, north, south-east and west. Strangers are always in a rush to get somewhere else.
Along with the chirping of cicadas, darkness fell and the towering hills gradually disappeared from the sight. The chilly wind blew from the jagged icy peaks in the northeast. Gradually, the huts in the neighborhood grew dimmer. Nevertheless, one could hear the constant babbling sound of the Sunkoshi River flowing east, even in the darkest night.
Early in the morning, even before dawn, the cock-a-doodle-doo gave a momentum to the huts and slowly the atmosphere turned noisy. There were several huts poorly fenced with dry leaves on the feet of the towering hill. Some of them were cleansed with white clay and others with red. In one corner, another miserable hut had been added, barely giving any shelter to me, my wife, my two sons and the daughter.
The very hut neither joined others nor was it too far from them. The house of Kaji, village headman, was on the other end of the brook and there were some other houses spreading out on the bank. The villagers would have no hesitation to make me carry their loads or make me chop firewood for them. I was in a pathetic condition without a home and my empty stomach always remained the same. There seemed no sign of improvements. I had been hardly surviving the sun and the rain for the past twenty years and would have to sleep under whatever space I found.
Eight years ago, there was landslide in my village. The sandbank of Sunkoshi lying on the foot of the towering green hill had been filled with the mass of rock and earth ever since. On the top of it, I had built my hut which I could claim as mine without any hesitation.
Enraptured by pleasure and delight at my home, I slept happily and woke up the next day with new determinations. I slowly came out, stood by the edge of the yard, yawned and stretched my body. Before, this place was a widespread sandbank of the Sunkoshi brook, with some shrubs and bushes here and there. I imagine the scene into my heart. A stone wall was erected on the edge of the Sunkoshi River and the land was terraced. Wheat, maize and millets seemed to be prodigally flourishing in the soil.
A sudden, dreadful thought arrested me. I blinked my eyes with disappointment and wiped them. The field was the same and so was my wrinkled face. The thought of my former land came dancing into my head. I could not persuade myself that I had turned the same bleak land into lush green fields.
“It used to be very much like this one…”
“But who would believe me now?”
“These …are the hands…”
My hands were the concrete evidences right there. With a strict obligation, I had chosen the substitute in order to escape the torrents of rain and scorching rays of the sun. I am thinking more and more.
‘But what if I lose this land just like the last one?’ A terrifying question concealing some sort of truth and reality vexed me. ‘How could Kanchha Bajé drive me away from here? He has convinced me to get my name registered in the land distribution program for the land-less. I have devoted my full strength for him throughout my life. Won’t he be kind to me?’ I tried to soothe myself.
Some villagers had assembled at the Lamasanghu Chok. I sat at one end and tried to mix myself among the people in the crowd.
“You have done a good job by building a hut,” an old villager said.
“A big tree certainly provides shelter during the rain,” the next one added.
“Kanchha Bajé did show his generosity,” another added. I tried to conjure a feeling of satisfaction on my face, although my heart didn’t smile. In a nook of my heart the turbulent clouds of suspicion were hovering. Soon someone broke the silence and said, “Can’t a tree fall upon the poor fellow during the wind and squeeze him?”
It sharpened my suspicion like a razor and my face grew pale. My former field was as good as Lamasanghu but Kanchha Bajé had banished me away from there. Similar thoughts kept writhing constantly in my mind. At last, defeated by feelings and circumstances, I ascribed everything to God.
I had spent all my life bound by the shackles of slavery. I could hardly sleep comfortably for a few hours. But Kanchha Bajé, who never had to do any work, was accumulating lots of money and fame. I was conscious that such were the treats of unseen gods.
The thought of such partial gods perplexed me. Still I would remember the gods whenever I faced any problem.
My daughter always asked me, “Father, is this our own land? Is the field ours too?”
“Of course, yes!” I replied. But I knew the fact that the land may or may not be our own.
After four years, the news of the land distribution program stirred the village. A few traces of hope dawned in my heart too. When the government officers came into my village, Kanchha Bajé once again tried to get my own name registered for the land. I moaned and wept awfully but all my vehement protests were guided roughly by the gusts of cold air blowing from the abode of white snow in the north and vanished thereby. I shuddered and felt as though I was falling down from one of the towering peaks.
The surveyor demanded evidence of my ownership of the land I presently occupied. I had none. Instead, Kanchha Bajé produced them, and claimed the piece for himself. My hand was empty. My evidences were dissolved in my own perspiration, and were lost in the beach. My labor was still reflected by the terraces. But nobody spoke a word. They just looked at each other mutely. A few of them were whispering, “Kanchha Bajé… victimized …him.”
Like a wounded deer, I dragged myself down to the Panchayat, the local governing unit. The Chief of the village council suggested I write an application. With a pale face seemingly suppressed by the huge sky I went to Binod for help.
“Could you write a letter for the Panchyat on my behalf?” I requested Binod. “I am being crushed by a big tree. Please help me,” I pleaded.
On hearing such a sentiments, Binod tried to elucidate the fact: “You mean Kanchha Bajé is going to grasp the land supposed to be yours?”
“It seems so, but the Panchayat is asking for an application.”
With a face withering with sorrow, Binod said, “How can just a piece of paper favor you and defeat him? His fame is widespread among all the round bellies. Nobody knows you. Who will support you? How can you go against Bajé?”
“Isn’t the land a reward to my own diligence? Did Bajé make the land? Is all my dedication to it worthless…?” I blazed tremendously as if a hot wind of divine sensation was inspiring me.
“What you are saying is absolutely true, but in government’s paper, your claim is null and void. If you and those like you are tolerant, there will always be Kanchha Bajé to exploit you.”
I felt as if I had just fallen from a New World onto the earth, and before me was a vague and hazardous track blocked by innumerable thorns and tough challenges. My eyelashes were fixed and immovable. Vivid feeling floated in my heart brimming with sad regret and desperate thoughts.
“Are all the men living in the shade of these hills animals? Is only Kanchha Bajé a human here? Don’t the poor people have an claim upon the reward for their hardship?” I asked in a row.
With eyes wide open, Binod stared at me for a moment and said, “Poor people also have the meaning of their labor but it utterly depends upon the hands of humans like Kanchha Bajé. For that, we should shout against them; only then it will be possible.”
I didn’t understand at all what Binod said but I had no courage to ask him to repeat the words. All the houses under the hill seemed to be listening to Binod.
Still, there were a number of questions dwelling on my face. After thinking for long, I decided to go to the Panchayat with an application. So I said, “Just write an application for me although I’m sure my efforts won’t bear fruits. I want to leave everything to God; he’ll show the right path.”
“Well, writing an application is not a problem for me, but it is impossible for Kanchha Bajé to leave the land for you.”
I shook my head in ignorance at the truth spoken by Binod. Memories of my former land being looted came as a flash of lightening into my head.
At that time too, there were similar rumors about land distribution to the landless, but it turned out to be a joke for me. Everyone that favored me suggested writing an application; so I asked Binod for it but Binod, who well knew that the application would be of no worth, refused to write.
“Struggle as you might, but the claws of the devil are too big for you.” Binod was still advising me.
Various thoughts started battling violently in my head and I hesitated to obey all the advices of Binod at once. I gradually stood from there and went to the Panchayat with a pitiful scrawny face. The Panchayat didn’t consider my application for want of legal proofs.
Again I stared at the green hill of my village. I thought I was no more than a weak tree about to fall during a turbulent storm.
***
[Adhikari is an MA in English from Pokhara University]