A letter from Sita


 Received this freshly, this morning. The postman with feathery appendages, cooed on the windowsill, till I gave a hand to it. The parchment paper was thin, the inked words bold, and the biggest surprise came to me when I found it was handwritten. Gosh!! Was it from the Rigveda or so? In the era of print, who writes in ink? Seems some silly joke, I thought yet the ruins of my sensibility urged me to read it. I fear a terrorist threat, so reading it aloud with you, 

Dear Aparna, 

This is a soul in distress, writing to you from Janakpuri. Remember we met in the Forests of Enchantments? It was so thoughtful of Chitra to have brought about this meeting and many more, so that I could get inspired by modern women. 

      Whatever has been said about me-the strength, resilience and endurance is at one end, but right now my heart is doing somersaults thinking what you will say. Yet, I choose to bare it open. I HATE RAM for what he has done to me. I hate to be called his wife. His love for me was ephemeral and I took it to be eternal. What a jester I was in this circus of marriage? Not once but twice my morales tested and not once, an apology directed. The Avataar of Vishnu, the son of Dashrath, the pride of house of Raghus doesn't have a heart of gold. Power and control, encapsulate his living. These strangulating my survival. He doesn't abuse me or inflict pain on me, yet he doesn't honour me in his space. I am expected to be his spotless shadow, his shimmering aura. 

The world calls him Maryadam Purshottam. Why, because he never fell for any other woman? Or for his imprudent ways failed to impress a woman? How can I trust a man of voluptuous desires to be celibate for years, when I was discarded as a piece of scrap in Vashitha Rishi's ashram? 

    Today as I speak to many like you, I want to break the shackles of autocratic tyranny. Not wanting a single woman to imbibe my spineless living. I have come back to be the Vaidehi of Janak. The chains of being the Sita of Ayodhya have rusted and I broke free.  Will you do me a favour? Take off my idol from beside Ram, and if you wish, build a Sita Mandir instead of Ram Mandir! Preach your children the Sitayan than Ramayan.

Yours Independently, 

Sita.

Man, is she crazy? Out of her mind? Who abandons a life of servants and luxury? Who walks out of a palace with hundred rooms? Just because your husband doesn't value you? Babes, you value his money, his status. What's the harm in being an arm candy, if you are decked with solitaires? Women and their filthy desires, want to order the cake, eat it and lick the cherry too. Grow up, you won't get a fool proof package. This isn't some 5days, 6nights package to Malaysia. This is life. Packed with indiscrepancy, inadequacies and loads of infidelity, be real and practical. Smiles plastered on cosmetic faces, get the glass and say cheers. 

Hey Mrs. Sita or Ms. Vaidehi, whoever you are, can you hear that?? Ohh, the Masakali waits for a reply. Typing it darling. Here you go with a fresh printout. Untill next birth don't complain. And if you find a Raavan make peace. Not all good guys are great and not all bad guys are bastards!! 

Comments

  1. Bhumika Chakraborty4 May 2021 at 08:32

    Wow ma'am.. Loved it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sakshi Bhatnagar4 May 2021 at 09:13

    Too good to comment...even I have the same feeling......its better to be Vaidehi than being Sits at cost of self respect and dignity

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

In the pursuit of pizza, discovering people.

Image
  I can only tell stories. That doesn’t sound like a great opening to a blog, right? Especially when you are looking at a giant called Happiness. Well, I can’t do much about it because I can only tell stories. Stories to me are happiness.  What kind of stories you will ask? Love stories? Horror stories? Thrilling stories? Adventurous stories? A little bit of everything, I would say. Like the Mumbai bhelpuri, tangy, spicy, sweet, and fulfilling. Again an old comparison. But what to do? That is what I’m made up of. Stories and food. Stories of people around me. I’m no unique individual. I’m a fragment of my mother, my father, my son, my husband, my friends, and even my milkman and house-help. Sometimes, I’m also like the rickshaw driver, in whose vehicle I commute every day to work. You must be finding it very funny. But many times, I’m like my pressure cooker and mixer grinder, too. I start abruptly whistling, when the there is too much pressure inside me. When I find too man...
Read more

Not Before Me- a book raising questions in a quest to find answers on disability.

Image
 Sixteen years ago, fresh out of the medical college, as an enthusiastic doctor, I visited the Bidada Medical Camp in Kutch Gujarat, as a volunteer. Amongst the thousands of patients I saw, this mother, aged between 65-70 years, stayed in my troubling thoughts for a long time. She had come to the camp to meet specialists who were visiting India to treat the ragged and frayed people of Kutch for free.  I remember her as a mother of an adult specially abled child. The father had passed away a few years back. No siblings to follow. ‘What after me?’ was the thought that stung her day in and out as she cared for her son. She had come to the camp in the hope that somewhere there would be a place that would care for her son once the heavens had embraced her. The staff refused to help the mother because her plea did not fall into any surgical or medical category.  Years later, as I read the book Not Before You, authored by Lata Gwalani, this mother knocked on my doors in Jaya’s d...
Read more

KICKED INTO LIGHT

Image
 What a miracle she was!! Waking up at the crack of dawn, before the first ray could find its way flittering through the dense blanket of darkness- she was my Amma. Splashing some cold water on her comely but tired face, she lit the firewood to facilitate a warm bath for both of us. This firewood was a stellar luxury, for the zamindar granted us the comfort only on special occasions. And today was Diwali!  As she washed her long locks, which were tied in a taut bun, Chutki, my elder sister, demanded to be lifted in her arms. Amma quickly winded up the bathing ritual and rushed to comfort Chutki. The first light that dispelled the darkness of the hut scared Chutki. It had become a routine for her to wake up crying, as the demons of the past brought out their ugly heads in her dreams.  "Kuruvi…" Amma's little birdie, that she was, "…we are far, far away from the tormentors. The ghosts of animosity have left for their graveyards."  Amma clemently brushed aside the ...
Read more