Chapter 46
Maverick and Ghalib were back. And even though the world did not see them, they each saw the other.
And that was enough. Iram smiled, thinking about that word.
How they had started on that word. Not dreamt for the stars or reached for the moon, just tried to touch the glass between them and the sky. Enough.
“Look — Baba,” she pointed, holding Yathaarth up in her arms as the small gathering tightened around the rock by the bank of the pristinely flowing Ganga.
This small village near Rishikesh was inhabited by some of the wealthiest and most influential farmers in the region.
All low-profile families, third and fourth generation residents.
Their days began with Ganga pooja and ended with Ganga aarti.
Atharva had caught them at the dawn of Ganga pooja.
The winter sun was already rising, its rays kissing the milky flow of the river as it ruffled over gorgeous, equally fair rocks and white sand.
Iram stood to the side with a few party workers, taking in the vista, as well as the locals gathering around Atharva.
“Ganga Maiya ki…” Atharva stepped up on the small rock. No mic, no show-sha, not even his leader-voice.
“Jai!”
“Ganga Maiya ki…”
“Jai!”
“Mera naam Atharva Singh Kaul hai. Main ek Kashmiri hoon. Main yahan Shimla se aaya hoon. Main yahan ka niwaasi nahi hoon. Lekin maine apne jeevan ke kuch saal Dehradun ke IMA mein bitaaye hai. Aur jitna waqt humne institute ke andar bitaya, utna Uttarakhand ke pahadon or gaavon mein bhi bitaya. Officially aur…” he paused with a small smile. “Unofficially bhi.[70]”
Low chuckles caught on.
“Anand Bishtji ne mujhe yahan aane ka nyota diya,” Atharva nodded to one of their residents who had been a close aide of HDP.
“Uske liye main unka aabhari hoon. Main ek fauji tha, aaj ek neta hoon. Aur jitna Bharat maine dekha, uske naam par meri ek hi soch bani — iss desh ki pragati aaj tak kaise ruki hui hai? Iss desh ki pragati kisine kaise roki hai? Humare paas sab kuch hai — itihas, shaurya, bal, sahitya, vigyan… aur uss vigyan ko aage badhane ki taakat. Humaare paas jawan hai, aur,” he paused, making eye contact with everybody gathered there.
“Humare paas humare annadata, humare kisaan hai.[71]”
Iram felt the roar of the river in her ears and nothing else.
She eyed her son, in a rare zapped moment, eyes fixated on his father.
A rush of pride shot up her spine. Atharva thought he was failing Yathaarth by raising him away from his home.
But didn’t he see he was raising Yathaarth showing him what a fight looked like?
Not a physical one, but a spiritual one, one that everybody fought in their lives.
Some had mountains bigger than others to climb.
The two of them had been confronted with Everests to conquer in storms. And that is what Yathaarth saw — two parents who were climbing against the forces and doing everything in their power to keep him happy.
She smiled brighter, the roar of Ganga in her ears torn by a voice. The voice that had always had a way of tearing through all the clutter, since that very first time under the handcart.
“Kashmir Development Party aaj Jammu-Kashmir ki vaadiyon mein lagi saalon ki aag ki lapton ko shaant kar rahi hai.[72]”
Iram winced inwardly. She had been against using any reference to Kashmir or KDP. But it was inevitable, as Atharva had pointed. That was where everything had begun. They couldn’t brush it under the carpet.
“But what if they question your externment? Question you?”
“Then we answer that it’s under investigation and hence not up for comments.”
“And if they remind you that Kashmir is not as peaceful as you had promised it would be in your election speeches?”
“Then I tell them it’s a process — many steps forward, a few steps back.”
“Or you can tell them that it’s not your headache anymore!”
She had huffed, hitting laptop keys too hard to the background score of rich laughter.
“Sirf aag hi nahi bujh rahi balki dugni gati se vikas ke kshetra mein kaam bhi ho rahe hai. Aaj teen dams ka kaam pura hua hai. Dakshin Kashmir ke gaavon mein hydroelectricity paida ho rahi hai. Yeh woh gaanv hai jahan bijli ki sirf kahaniyaan sunai jaati thi. Aaj unki parikalpana na keval unke gharon ko roshan kar rahi hai balki unke khet aur baagon ka utpaad teen guna badha rahi hai.[73]”
All of that was Atharva. He had kick-started all those projects.
He hadn’t been there to flag them when they started.
Iram’s guilt and resentment had transformed into a low-simmering rage in the last two years.
If Qureshi had been decent in replacing Atharva, it would not have mattered at all.
But he was hostile, and continued to be hostile, barring their way home.
He took the credit for Atharva’s work as all of the projects started in the first three years of KDP government were coming to fruition now.
He took them into election campaigns. That was ok, that was how the world worked.
But he was so insecure that he was driving Atharva further away from Kashmir.
A tiny hand hit her cheek. She startled.
“Dilbaro, no,” she grabbed his wrist and kissed the centre of his palm. “What did I tell you? No hitting.”
He threw his head into her shoulder and let out a wail.
She immediately turned and started to walk back towards their parked car in the distance.
A fleet of three others from local leaders was parked but their Land Rover was front and centre.
Iram glanced over her shoulder at Atharva stepping down from the stone, still talking.
So he had reached that stage, where he would begin interacting and talking about the natural disasters in the region? She would miss that part.
Yathaarth’s body began to wiggle and his cries grew louder. The terrible twos had hit him too late.
“Quiet, Arth,” she handled him one-handed and reached into the open window of the car to grab the ziplock of cookies she had kept ready on the dashboard for these hunger pangs. Iram took it and settled her son on the bonnet of the car. His wet eyes were angry and his hands flailing.
“Quiet,” she widened her eyes at him. He frowned, pouted, but kept crying.
Iram handed him one of the almond-honey cookies and he threw it away.
She liked to believe it was because he was generally irritated and not because the cookies were made of oats.
She had raised him on the good kind of baked goods.
“Arth…” she snaked an arm into the open window and grabbed his sippy cup of water.
She popped it into his mouth and he went silent.
Iram sighed inwardly, holding eye contact with him.
The stubborn boy was basically an amalgamation of her and his father.
A combination that turned brutal when he was hungry and did not understand it.
Iram let him sip his water in silence, breaking away from his eyes to check for the village meeting.
It was disbursing, the people chatting with the HDP members they had brought along.
Atharva was striding towards them, talking to Anand Bisht, his contact in this village.
“That went well…” his voice carried over on the wind.
“That went better than well. Now that you have opened this conversation, we will take it forward, Atharva Bhaiya. Bhabhiji…” he waved to her. “We are done here. Now we will go to my home for breakfast. Munna alright?”
“Yes,” Iram smiled. “Just hungry and… I think, sleepy.”
Bishtji waved and turned back. Atharva continued to stride towards them.
“How was it?”
“Exactly as we planned.”
“Aren't you staying back to do your post-rally networking?”
He rounded the car and came to them, eyeing Yathaarth as he mutinously sipped his water.
“If I open up for conversation, the questions will be crazy.”
“I know,” she gave him an ‘I-told-you-so’ look.
“My job was to gather, address and spark it off. Now I have a meeting with the local members that we are recruiting for HDP.”
“Wait, this is Uttarakhand. It should be UDP,” Iram pointed.
“Yes, so… that might change to NDP. That discussion is happening next weekend with Zorji, Adil, Samar and Qureshi. They are all coming to Shimla. Khatriji and some senior leaders from Himachal will also be present.”
“North India Development Party?”
“Correct.”
“Just make it India Development Party…”
A thump and Iram glanced at the sippy cup rolling down the car bonnet. She caught it before it fell down in the sand when her son’s little hand whacked her jaw.
“Arth, I said…”
“What did you just do?” Atharva’s cold words cut through her slow rebuke. Iram straightened to see his eyes locked on his son. Yathaarth flung both hands out in anger but before they could reach her, Atharva had grabbed them and lifted his son up. He began to stride away.
“Atharva…”
He did not listen.
Atharva strode, Yathaarth squirming in his hold, trying to get his hands free.
He wouldn’t meet his eyes and Atharva kept staring into them.
He ignored the conversations going on in the background, the flow of the river making enough noise to drown out what he was about to tell his punk of a toddler.
“Do it again.” Atharva stood him up on the back bumper of his car and held him steady. Yathaarth’s tiny brows knitted and his mouth became an angry round. But he stayed, eyes slowly meeting his.
“Do it again,” Atharva let his hands go. He didn’t move them.
Atharva let the minute tick, breaking that attitude with his eyes. Yathaarth lowered his gaze, blinking rapidly at the flowing river.
“Look at me, Arth.”
Frown, blinks, squirming.
“I said, look at me.”
He reluctantly glanced up, then looked away. Then slowly brought his eyes back, the anger faded to guilt. Good. He realised it.
“You are not supposed to raise your hand at anybody,” Atharva seared into his eyes.
His lower lip jutted out, wobbling. Iram would melt at it, he wouldn’t.