Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from June, 2014

I was shamelessly staring at him.

I realized I was shamelessly staring at him but I didn't cease. At the gas station, our bus was standing among vehicles which constantly honked horns. The conductor was engaged in a fight, a brutal one they said, which I didn't bother to look at. Soon the bus driver, too, became a part of it.  Half past one, the heat was intense. Cacophony surrounded me.  Abuses to pleads. One spat paan while the fight continued. For the young men it was a recreation, "Let's call the Prime Minister to sort this out", one joked. An elderly man staring at young girls playing. Women fanning themselves with the loose end of their saree and their mother-in-laws frowning at them as their sarees slipped from their heads. A mother grabbing a handful of chips from the packet her daughter was holding, chewing, cursing the weather, and the fighting men, as few bits fell off her mouth. An unmarried couple, taking all the advantage of the half-empty bus. A lady, post staring me from he

Help her?

“My face is BURNING” Never before did she scream that way. Three middle-aged men stood beside her grinning, showing off their yellow teeth between the parted brown lips. “HELP ME. I don’t want...” She fainted. She opened her eyes in the Burn ward. They said it took two weeks of intense care to bring her back to senses. “Get her a pen and paper”, the officer commanded. “I can speak. BURN them” She could see no more but in her eyes, fury was explicit. “We assure you that. Tell us what had happened”, the officer spoke gentle. “That night, I was asleep in my room when I woke up with...” She coughed. “...Men talking” She coughed again. “Rape...Acid...” She breathed heavily. Her eyes rolled up. She turned pale. Who were they? Educated illiterates. How is taking away her face (and life), happiness to them? I don’t know the answer to this but tell them, beauty is a great source of masturbation and that would have been perpetual. Is that is how we can st