Tag: Kolkata

By Devraj Singh Kalsi

Original art works by leading painters and sculptors selling for millions internationally were up for grabs because of the special two-day sale exhibition organised in a leading art gallery. Though it was not something common like an apparel sale, with irresistible buy-one-get-one-free offers that people flock to during the weekends, yet there was a sizeable crowd of potential art buyers who were driven by the prospective gains of making this trek.

The sale exhibition lured art aficionados and investors from business families along with salaried employees from middle-class families who were ready to cancel their annual holiday plans to spend the money on buying an art piece when the share market was topsy-turvy due to global meltdown. Customers who queued up as early as four in the morning had no clear idea of the mystery behind the affordable prices with a modest upper cap. Some of them thought these were slightly damaged art works – much like the rejected export items sold in factory outlets. 

As the famed artists were selling some of their pieces at throwaway prices, it was a golden chance to invest in art at a very affordable budget segment. On a practical note, an artist does not always produce masterpiece after masterpiece so he cannot sell everything at a steep price in the auction house. Some of the greatest artists have created pretty ordinary work before they refined their sensibilities. I reasoned these were some of those amateurish works they could not sell for millions. Instead of stocking them up, they chose to make some money out of their mediocre art pieces. These artworks would probably fetch a good price after their demise so it was wise to pick up the ones from the seniormost artists who would bid us farewell soon and the auction price of their genuine art works would instantly boom.  

What is now a steal would become a handsome deal and fetch millions and make me a millionaire overnight. Since the exhibiting gallery had all the displayed pieces certified as original stuff, I could safely make the investment. Having shortlisted a few names in my mind, I went around the gallery walls glowing with spotlights and enriched with their works and cherrypicked a couple of those without trying to understand the meaning of the art piece. Something abstract always catches attention.

Since there was a heavy rush of potential buyers jostling and pushing each other to lay their hands on their preferred pieces before they vanished, I chose to skate around corners with lesser density of shoppers. The speed with which these paintings disappeared from the walls was amazing. As there was not much to choose from after the top names were sold out, I faced the dilemma of finding the right parameters to finalise from the works of upcoming artists who managed to find display space. There was not much discussion about their commercial potential in the art world to assist buyers to bet on their creativity.

I was left with my instinct and my flawed sense of judgment when I went around in confusion, in search of clarity and finally staked claim on a painting by a lady painter who used a plant to outline the female form in acrylic. I hoped and prayed she would become another Shergill after a decade or two.

The lady at the counter examined my choice and smiled. I did not understand for sure whether her smile indicated approval in this case. Was she feeling happy that I made the right choice? Or she appreciated that I was a worshipper of the female form? She used some highfalutin words of praise on my taste in art and called it a very good purchase. I read it as her support and admiration for my foresight and insight. While the reaction of others around was much less than what is called envy or enthusiasm, they seemed to be more familiar with the name of the artists who was scheduled to arrive at the gallery for promotion of her art works later in the day.

People with limitless knowledge were discussing art works like highbrow critics. As a first-time art buyer, I had no such interest in the richness of the art. The commercial worth was what was keeping me curious. I wanted to grab a few words of praise from them about the artist I had invested in.

I decided to approach an old man and ask him about the potential of the woman painter but he did not show much excitement except making the prediction that I could easily get double the purchase price in the next decade. I was not thrilled to hear this forecast that barely covered inflation. Since I had already made the purchase, I got it packed and prepared to leave with a heavy heart.

While coming out, I was approached by a journalist who thrust the mike in front of me and the cameraman identified me as a buyer and focused on the covered painting in my hand. I was asked what I bought and why. Since I myself knew nothing much, I could not furnish a proper answer except mentioning the name and the price and then wrapping it off with a smile and an urgency to leave as my car had arrived at the gate.

This quick bite made me curious. When the programme was aired late, I found my interview missing. Some other interesting faces were featured. Perhaps the news editor judged me as a worthless, uncouth buyer who was looking for dirty profit and nothing else.

I decided to make the painting the prime showpiece on the wall of my living room. I cast a detailed look at it to find potential but it was beyond my understanding. Whenever a male guest came in, he looked up and admired without offering a reason, making me ashamed of my ignorance while the rest of the people appeared to know a lot about art. Conversation flowed but I kept silent.

Whenever a woman came in, she looked away. I chose to ignore the reactions of my guests and continued to display it with pride and clicked my profile status shots in front of it. Seated on the couch, with the painting in the background forming a clean artistic backdrop, I sported a confident look with a strong impression that I was an art lover though it was far from the truth. I knew I was another one of those pseudo art-lover who claimed to know the world of art inside out but was actually purely a money-minded nerd who was waiting for progress in the status of the painter – to fetch a good market price for her works. I would feel proud that since I have an original piece by the same painter. I could consider myself a rich person who would sell the painting later to invest the proceeds and accumulate a large corpus of retirement funds.

For ten years I waited for the death or disappearance of the painter but she was blessed with a long, healthy life. I checked her health status and she was doing fine. I knew another wait for a decade for her pop-off was on the cards.

When she finally died in a freak accident, I thought the good times had come. I was a mean profiteer who wanted to sell off this art work and make a mega profit.  

I took it to an art gallery and asked how much it would fetch now. The quoted price was well below the expectation. I was asked to keep it with me for another two decades and then see how much it would fetch. I decided to wait till my retirement to calculate whether it would surpass my insurance or provident fund payout. I checked it again but the price, though high, barely crossed the bond returns.

After holding on for so long, I decided to sell the art work in the market. Attracting private collectors meant a tough time with negotiators. I went to the corporate honchos who would pay well. Finally I chose the company I worked for in the past and quoted an exorbitant price for the painting which he negotiated hard like a salary deal and finally handed me a cheque for the acrylic painting which he would proudly display in the corridor near the lobby. Though I did not get my preferred price, I chose to be happy as the investment made after sacrificing one annual holiday trip had made me rich enough to afford an annual holiday for the rest of my retired life.  

Devraj Singh Kalsi works as a senior copywriter in Kolkata. His short stories and essays have been published in Deccan Herald, Tehelka, Kitaab, Earthen Lamp Journal, Assam Tribune, and The Statesman. Pal Motors is his first novel.  

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access Wild Winds: The Borderless Anthology of Poems

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

By Devraj Singh Kalsi

I was eating a protein energy bar by the riverside, looking at the serene flow of water and absorbing the positive vibes. I find this therapy more potent and relaxing than meditating as the evil faces of my enemies appear in front of my closed eyes, dancing with swords and breaking my concentration.

When it comes to letting things go, the riverside is the ideal spot. It carried the ashes of my beloved parents and since then I believe it can carry almost everything from life — including guilt, burden, failures, and memories. With less philosophical ramblings about spiritual encounters associated with ghats, I would like to share some interesting takeaways the riverside trip offered.   

The sight of lovers stretching and entwining their legs on the steps leading to the river, hiding their faces under the black umbrella, kindles the desire to emulate their masked boldness. Before I can soak in their leisure moments of passion and pleasure, I am scared to imagine the consequences of a disagreement between the couple, with one of the immature lovers suddenly getting up and jumping into the river. What I tried not to think about has happened in a jiffy. Reality imitates imagination or it is the power of manifestation at work.   

I consider this to be a hasty act of suicide committed in a tearing hurry to exit this painful world. A few minutes later, his hand becomes visible like a party symbol trying to stay afloat. He swims to the shore and flaunts his survival skills, going against the tide, against the flow, with the girl clapping and cheering for him. She offers him a chocolate as a token reward of acceptance and plants a kiss on his cheek with her hands cupping his wet face. Her black umbrella grabs the chance to take flight like a broken kite for a while and then tumbles down the stairs to join the mighty river. Another bystander tries to clutch the black umbrella and he himself slips and slides into the river, shouting for help.

I sit wondering whether this is a classic example of extra dark humour. How a stranger meets his tragic end while trying to save an umbrella and the couple engaged in kissing remains totally unaware of how their umbrella has led to a death by drowning in front of them while they celebrated love and union.   

Trained swimmers dived in at last but it was too late to rescue the man alive. Cops descended on the scene to launch a raid – to arrest the lovers engaged in obscene activities but they were burdened with the boring job of identifying the victim and gathering witnesses and evidence to prove it was not a case of accident but a cold-blooded murder.

I became engrossed in what I had seen before me. My relaxation gave way to creativity as I began to imagine fresh ways of interpreting this episode. The lovers staged a futile attempt to escape from the riverside. The police chased them to gather an account of how this had happened. They could not reconstruct the scene as they had seen nothing. They did not confess they were lost in amorous activities in a public place. The girl showed nervousness when the cops threatened to inform her family.

It was getting dark. The guy feared torture and arrest. He became selfish and was ready to forget the girl forever if he was set free. His folded hands praying for release melted the senior officer’s heart and the lover who made tall promises seemed to run for his life and freedom.

As he ran fast without looking back at the girl, the sleeping dog on the bench woke up and chased him faster than the obese cops could have managed. Before he could exit the park gate, his leg was bitten by the dog. Perhaps it was karma instantly paying him back for deserting his beloved in the hour of crisis. He limped out of the park and hired a rickshaw to take him to the nearest hospital.

The dog came wagging its tail to celebrate the triumph. The aftertaste of a fleshy leg bite kept his salivating tongue hanging loose. A beggar boy in a torn shirt shared his biscuits with the dog while a young influencer made a reel out of his act of kindness for millions of viewers to boost his own income.

The cops grilled the girl in the park. Other people loitering around were asked if they had seen anything. Though I had seen it all, I did not utter a single word to avoid interrogation. The girl was clever to embroil me. She said I was a key witness who saw what had happened, right from the start till the end.

I told them just like the guy, the girl was also innocent. My brief testimony set the girl free. She rushed forward and hugged me to thank me from the bottom of her heart. So heartfelt that the cops found reason to suspect something fishy again. Her behaviour gave inconsistent signals.

The cops were under the impression – before I confirmed anything – that the girl and her lover had brought the victim, who was probably her groom, and then she pushed him into the river to get rid of him forever. Their theory was a possibility as there were similar incidents recorded in the recent past. I dismissed all of that like a prime investigator and the cops believed every single word of the narrator. Nobody in my family had ever believed me so fast, without a shred of doubt.  Did I speak the entire truth or had I concocted a portion of it?

The baton-wielding cops quit the hot pursuit to nab the murderer at the crime spot and went away with the dead, bloated body zipped up in a white plastic cover along with an unidentified black umbrella as a piece of circumstantial evidence and registered it as a freak accident due to negligence.  

The girl started abusing the guy who deserted her. Then she changed her stance. She thanked her stars she got the chance to identify a coward. She fell in love with my brutal honesty and expressed gratitude for defending her and proclaiming her innocence in front of the cops. It restored her faith in humanity.

As she was alone, she asked me to drop her home, which was not very far. I told her she could have asked the cops for a lift in the van. She said she did not trust them. Besides, alighting from a police van would have raised family suspicions. Here was a stranger, a young girl, completely trusting me without knowing anything about me.

I was feeling elated with this booster dose as nobody in my life, neither my bosses nor my publishers, exhibited such absolute trust. I decided to accompany her and drop her at the entrance gate. I thought she would invite me in and introduce me to her family as a saviour of sorts. I was thinking of such positive things when there was a phone call. She said I need not bother as her brother was already looking for her. She gave him the riverside address and he came on his motorbike soon. She knew she was not going to find me again but she forgot to ask for my contact details. I told her I come here every evening around this time. I was confident she would be there the next day.  

I went to the riverside at the same time with the fond hope to meet her. She did not turn up. I repeated riverside visits for seven consecutive days like a penance. Then I decided to stop as it was causing undue stress. What was supposed to be the equivalent of meditative experience had added to my anxiety. I was always reminded of her, whenever I saw a girl with a black umbrella seated on the steps.   

A week later, she came to the same place and sat beside me on the bench. I was taking a nap. She waited for me to wake up. When I opened my eyes, I saw her smiling face. She was restless to share a lot just as I was eager to know about her long absence. 

I wanted to know if everything was proceeding well in her life. Without answering me, she confessed she knew I came here every day. The beggar boy — an untrained spy(?) – had told her.

I was wondering why she did not show up earlier. She said she was waiting for the outcome of her divorce proceedings before meeting me with a proposal. The case was put in abeyance, if not dismissed, since her husband went missing and nobody from his family living overseas suspected he was dead. His horoscope predicting a long life prevented them from jumping to any conclusion. She was busy with legal consultations. The unclaimed body recovered from the river was finally consigned to flames by the riverside. This was another abrupt turn of events – beyond my imagination. But this was her side of the story.   

She was young and married and divorced and probably widowed. I asked her how she would like to live the rest of her life. She said she was required to wait for seven years before she could tie the knot. A live-in relationship was okay for her as she had inherited sufficient wealth to support herself.

She was quick to respond with a decent proposal, checking out if I was free and willing for a live-in stint for seven years. I told her I was a writer working on a big, fat novel and for this arrangement she would have to support me financially on a salary basis. She approved that instantly and chose to call it a conditional love affair with full mutual benefits. Much better than unconditional love that comes with more baggage.

I felt relaxed now as my prime worry of financial support for the next decade was taken care of by her. I decided I could lock myself in a room for seven long years to complete the magnum opus without the haunting fear of commercial failure. Sometimes both of us could come and sit by the riverside in the evening for the sake of nostalgia, down memory lane and also meet the beggar boy and the sleeping dog on the bench.   

I disclosed to her that I was stuck in a key character development and I wanted to make it breathe. I planned an evening near the riverside. But she refused to go to the riverside again.

I escaped domestic confinement and ventured out for riverside reflection alone. I saw many couples in intimate postures in the presence of strangers. I wanted to take a boat ride and looked for an able-bodied boatman who could anchor safely. As we reached the middle of the river, dark grey clouds gathered in the horizon and the boatman said we should return to the shore.

When I came back and reached the steps, I saw my live-in standing alone by the river. She asked me who I had come with. I said I was alone. She asked the boatman for the full truth after giving him a handsome tip. He said I dropped the special lady guest on the other side of the river and then came back. For the lure of a bribe, the boatman put me in a difficult situation.  

She came home without creating a scene and wanted to know who was Niru in my story. I called her a character in my imagination but she called it my past. She suspected she was the same lady the boatman referred to. There was a clear mention of the girl who crossed the river to meet her lover in the story in the making. I was trapped in my own creation.

I said the river takes everything from you, whatever clings to you. She did not get the layered meaning and cried a lot over my betrayal. I told her since we were not married, she should not get emotional. We were just in a temporary phase of togetherness and then separation was bound to follow. She found it impossible to accept compromises and demanded loyalty while I raised a parallel demand for a life without suspicion. We were like the two banks of the river that could never meet.

She promised she would not let me complete the novel so that my fate continued to hang in balance. She began to make it happen and, within a year, I noticed my creative burnout and slow down with useless chores and nonsensical issues. Seven years passed, the novel remained incomplete and she was delighted to have won. I was offered another lifeline of extension for seven years and I chose to avail this chance and bring my novel to a definite end.  

In case I could not manage to do so, I would go to the riverside and immerse the incomplete manuscript. Like the river carried my all, let the stories also perish in its flow and find a new direction.

Devraj Singh Kalsi works as a senior copywriter in Kolkata. His short stories and essays have been published in Deccan Herald, Tehelka, Kitaab, Earthen Lamp Journal, Assam Tribune, and The Statesman. Pal Motors is his first novel.  

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access Wild Winds: The Borderless Anthology of Poems

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

By Devraj Singh Kalsi

What will you do with the sherwani? Do you think you’ll wear it again?  You remember you haven’t tried it once in the past ten years. Why don’t you start wearing it as an overcoat in winters? Have you decided to keep it as a relic or what? Can’t you see it is occupying so much of the wardrobe space? Will the shoulders fit? Why don’t you just donate it now? A barrage of such questions left me wondering how to answer with brevity and conviction.

The wedding lehnga with heavy brocade work was also consuming plenty of almirah space. It was also not used once in all these years. But it was not gifted to any needy woman tying the nuptial knot with unfulfilled dreams of wearing a lehnga on her wedding day. It was preserved with care and concern, with naphthalene balls placed in the corners of the almirah to save it from damage. I had never raised these queries but my sherwani emerged as a prime piece of shimmery clothing that attracted her critical attention. I had a nagging feeling that she was planning for its ouster. I had to chalk out an emergency plan for its occasional, if not regular, use to ensure that she lost interest in my royal outfit forever.  

Since I did not attend wedding receptions because I expected to be welcomed and treated like the groom everywhere, I did not get the scope to wear the sherwani. Many friends — esteemed and otherwise — of the groom wore the sherwani. It was considered perfectly stylish. To revive the old tradition, I went to attend a wedding reception in the local area where I was told by some jealous acquaintances that my sherwani appeared odd and outdated. I looked around to scan the truth. I discovered that I was the only prominent guest wearing the nawabi sherwani while the rest of the invitees looked dashing in their ill-fitting formal blazer suits with printed neckties.

I could not manage a makeover at this stage. I chose to stay dressed in the sherwani and gulped the refreshments from various stalls. My mood and attitude and self-confidence got a tremendous boost when the sherwani invited a second look from the decked-up gorgeous aunties who recalled my wearing the same outfit on my wedding day. They seemed to discuss either my poverty or my simplicity, thanks to their good memory. Poor fellow, he has not saved enough to buy a new wedding outfit in these all years. Look, such a simple, down-to-earth guy who does not flash his wealth.

My wife probably overheard their conversation about my professional shortcomings. She came rushing to escort me and proposed we should leave the wedding hall before someone mistook me for a struggling salt-and-pepper haired poet and asked for a sher-o-shairi [1]session in the mehfil[2].  

My wife had no idea my sherwani would be remembered here as a stunning piece. I rejected her proposal to retreat after greeting the newly-wed couple on the stage. I claimed to be a more charming, well-dressed guy so I chose to hang around the place and observe the reactions of the crowd, get more photographs clicked as a doting couple more photogenic than the newly-weds.

She held my arm in front of the cameras and felt elated that my sherwani still garnered attention. It suited me more than any other formal suit. There were many people who were seeing me for the first time and the element of newness gave me a winning edge in their instant appraisal of well-dressed men present at the venue.  

On the way home after dinner, she surprised me with her request, urging me not to wear the antique piece again when I went out with her. Most of her friends had already seen me in this sherwani. Repetition reveals a lot about financial compulsion was her subtle message. I assured her that my sherwani would never become a source of embarrassment.

There were very few occasions I went out alone for parties. Yes, I went to the market for daily errands, to the bank for withdrawals, to the post office for booking speed post articles. I should make it a habit to wear the sherwani like a casual piece of clothing and wear it off fast to get rid of it at the earliest. I chose not to keep it safe from coffee stains or sauce spill-over while eating burgers or noodles.

Besides, what you start wearing something every day, it loses the tag of being fancy and special. It breeds familiarity and ordinariness. At least that is what I used to think then. Dump it in the laundry box for a normal machine wash instead of taking it gently packed in a carton to the gentle drycleaner.   

Along expected lines, I went to a bank for a transaction. The teller was amused to see me dressed in a sherwani on a sunny, sultry day. Are you attending some function today? He was trying to find a justification for the attire. I said I was just trying to feel the vibe of being a nawab even though my pocket made me feel like a pauper every day. The bank staff broke into peals of laughter and declined to clear the cheque because of insufficient balance in the account. I laughed out loud to confirm the truth of my joke.

I came out dejected, rejected, and chose to walk to the nearby chemist store to buy OTC pills for gastric relief. The florist in the corner beckoned me and sold a rose bud for the sherwani. Now you look smart, he said and charged me ten rupees for the unnecessary accessory. I changed my mind and began to walk home instead of visiting the chemist who would refuse me to identify me as a patient in my present avatar.

I told my wife that the sherwani was likely to foment trouble in my rather peaceful life. She argued it was nice to be spotted in a sherwani in the summer. My sherwani would enable me to establish my secular credentials with ease. She asked me to ignore people and their silly reactions even though she herself had not managed to do that yet. When the husband had already mastered the art of ignoring her volley of queries with a deafening silence, I could easily manage to fob off everything criticism that came my way. A revelation of her offended sentiments put me on the mute mode once again.    

One fine morning, I chose to visit the farmer’s market. They looked at me with distrust, perhaps thinking I was a zamindar who came to exploit them again. The sherwani continued to be identified as an aristocratic dress long associated with the wealthy royals so they chose to vent their suppressed anger on me without realising that the prosperous working middle-class had already hijacked this dress and changed the old narrative and perception.  

They increased the rates of fruits and vegetables to deliver a good lesson loaded with revenge for the atrocities perpetrated by the landed class over the centuries. My appearance in a sherwani provided them with a token opportunity to go hammer and tongs. I found myself poorer when I came back and I felt I should have gifted my sherwani to them to pacify their agitated minds. By taking it off in front of them I would have expressed solidarity with their struggle to expose the exploitative rich.

I confessed to her I couldnot remain in peace when I wore the sherwani in a public space. Finally, I decided to gift it to a young associate about to marry since I thought it would be expensive to order a new one. He refused to accept my sherwani and confirmed his choice of a Western suit, which he had already ordered by paying through his credit card. The sherwani was still quite a wearable, elegant dress and many heroes on the big screen wore it when they danced to woo the heroines during marriage functions. But he wanted to wear what his big boss in office wore every day.  

As a writer, I was made of sterner stuff. So, I decided to make a grand statement of style once again. I added a pen apart from a rose to glam up the appeal. I chose to board the bus or local train wearing my sherwani. Fellow passengers gave a weird look along with ample space to sit comfortably. They looked interested to have a conversation with me to know my pursuit. I said I am a writer who was currently visiting various places to gather material for his new work.

They were ready to accept me as a tourist from the other side of the border. One gentleman beside me asked if I wrote in Urdu or Persian. I said I write in plain English and he shot back with a suggestion that I should wear a coat and necktie like an Englishman.

I tried to sound smart by contending that the suit has already been usurped by corporate honchos and the necktie is a definite sign of slavery in modern times. My non-conformist views did not win instant approval from my fellow passengers who wanted to know my destination and my works. I wanted to share everything I could but the conductor in the meantime announced that my stop was nearby. I chose to get up quickly. My sherwani was damaged atlast! This set me free of the burden. I realised the sherwani was helping me understand the other way people tend to think about dress code.  

Making the sherwani a less celebrated wear by using it casually on ordinary days did not lead to any decline in its appeal as the older people still took note of it and reacted to it. Within a few months of regular use, it gathered lots of stains and spots. She assigned the job of making it squeaky clean to the dry cleaner. I was surprised to see her attempt to refurbish it.

Was it proposed to reduce her burden or was it a sure sign of her emotional attachment? My mind was still tumbling in confusion. When he saw the condition, he said he had not seen such a dirty sherwani in all his life. It was like a piece of everyday clothing, catching dust and grime all the time, wondering if I was posted in a mining area.  

I confessed it was indeed my preferred dress as I wore it often, almost like a standard uniform whenever I went for shopping or dining. He advised me to wear it occasionally to protect it and keep it safe in a plastic cover or else it would lose the shine with frequent cleaning attempts. He pointed at the worn collar. I showed no interest as my lacklustre life would not suffer if the sherwani suffered a loss of sheen. At least my better half would get a logical ground to discard it or exchange it for a kitchen utensil piece.

When I finally saw both the fancy dress items, Sherwani and Lehnga, packed and restored and displayed together in the wardrobe smelling fragrant like fresh rose, I was convinced that our marital bond had got a fresh lease of life.  

[1] Poetry recitation session

[2] Party

Devraj Singh Kalsi works as a senior copywriter in Kolkata. His short stories and essays have been published in Deccan Herald, Tehelka, Kitaab, Earthen Lamp Journal, Assam Tribune, and The Statesman. Pal Motors is his first novel.  

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access Wild Winds: The Borderless Anthology of Poems

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles