GE Short Stories ( Anita Ma'am )

She Had Asked Me ( Usne Kaha Tha ) by Chandradhar Sharma Guleri ( 1883-1922 ), one of the pioneers of the hindi short stories, he introduces the theme of pure love, sacrifice, valour and maintaining the centrality of an Indian experience and identity articulated an ideal patriot in foreign and unfamiliar territory. Dr. Ravi Nandan Sinha's English translation of this classic hindi short story showcases the opulence of hindi literature. He creates a cultural bridge amongst a generation and preserves the cultural effect with the embroyment of colloquial  style and incorporates combinations of Punjabi and Sanskrit dialects.

Lahna Singh, the chief protagonist of ‘She Had Asked Me'' a jamadar in 77 Sikh Rifles of the British Army fighting the Germans in France during world war 1. Every act of his heroism as a soldier is driven largely by the memory of his first love. A young sikh girl, he met as a child in the small town of Amritsar 25 years in the past and his promise to her as an adult just before leaves for battle in an unknown landscape.

The first part captures the hustle and bustle of a typical market in India with its crowd of people and animals. Its narrow circuitous allies and its variety of vendors all to familiar scene. In scene two of the story the narration shifts abruptly and transports the reader across time and place fast forwarding 25 years from India in 1889 to the winter of 1914, when Lahna Singh is anxiously awaiting battle in the trenches of France. His platoon has been on bunker duty for four days, another three to go before they are relieved. One of their fellow soldiers young Bodha Singh is ill and Lahna Singh is taking care of him. He not only gives the soldier his woolens but also does additional guard duty for him. A German soldier disguised lieutenant enters, tricks Subedar Hazar Singh into meeting a bulk of soldiers into an ambush leaving only a skeletal group behind. Lahna is one of those who is left behind sees through a ploy and sends a fellow soldier to alert the Subedar. He employs a simple test of Indian geography and culture which the real lieutenant whom he had known for five years would certainly have been familiar with. He asks the lieutenant to remember the time when they were hunting the antelopes in a particular district knowing full well that there were no antelopes to hunt there. He then recalls how on that trip the lieutenant rode on a donkey and the cook Abdullah stop at the temple to pay his respects to the deities again knowing that a high ranking british officer could never be caught riding a donkey and a muslim cook would not stop to worship at a hindu temple. With this test, Lahna Singh exposes the sky signifying his rational judgement. The imposter is eventually shot by Lahna Singh and German soldiers attack the bunker. He holds on the valiantly till Subedar and his group return. So the Germans annihilated bulk of Indians survive but Lahna Singh the hero is injured.

Lahna Singh is dying and his mind goes to the time when he is about to leave his village for the front. He had gone to meet his Subedar, who is to join him on a trip. The Subedar’s wife turns out to be the same girl who left Lahna Singh broken hearted 25 years ago. Subedar's son Bodha Singh is also a part of same regiment. The wife beseeches Lahna Singh to take care of her husband and her only son in the war on the strength of their childhood love. She pleads and entrust him with this task so great was Lahna's love for the girl and so moved by her request he fulfills with least regard for his own life. He dies in a foreign land where there is no pond of Bulel. Neither Keerat Singh's lap nor the shade of mango tree. Living Vazeera Singh with tears. Lahna Singh ends the story of his life, he rises above greatness sacrificing himself at the altar of love and duty. But he also leaves behind an important question as what would happen to his wife and son. Still we can very well come to a conclusion that while sacrificing himself. He knew very well the value of family and chose to save the only son and the husband of Subedaarni. Such a pure love instills a new life to the belief and confidence in humanity.

This story also reveals the ruthless picture of war and its effects. Indian soldiers as an unfortunate pawn in the game of power hegemony. Those who stake their life on the war front on behalf of the British Empire where to understand later their grims being treated as equals by the british rulers where mere illusions. Wazir's statement that those who die of pneumonia are not given any murabba's reflects the indifference of the government.

Translation of the short story 'Usne Kaha Tha' is quite evocative of the Punjabi countryside and the sensibility of the Punjabi characters. It also showcases the realities of life which forms the bases for Premchand to start his writing career. The historical significance of story cannot be denied. According to many researchers, this story is the first original story in Hindi in originality, artistic, skills, gravity of events, love and sacrifice. The story can claim the first rank.

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Misplaced Courage by Premchand.

Premchand, a master storyteller has been successful in crafting out the human psychology with the help of his words. In ‘Misplaced Courage’ he has put evident effort to depict the modus-operandi of human brain and the external influences which affect the decision making capabilities  of brain.

The story has been written with the ‘khilafat movement’ and ‘noncooperation movement’ in  its background. The story takes us back to the years before independence where people from all parts of life came together to achieve a common dream of ‘swaraj’ or ‘complete independence’. During such movement, people were refrained from drinking liquors, using foreign goods and adopting homemade ( swadeshi ) goods.

The chief protagonist of the play Munshi Maikulal Mukhtar, lives in Naubasta locality of Lucknow. He is portrayed as a very generous, helpful and kind guy. He has been addicted to liquor, charas and ganja. According to him, ‘ganja and charas activated his knowledge, and when he smoked he entered into a state of meditation and experienced a sense of non-attachment to worldly things’. It has been their daily routine to sit and drink at the end of the day. Algu, his servant has the job to bring liquor, charas and ganja for him. 

A day, as usual. Munshi ji, along with his friends ( Rambali, Bechan, Jhinku and Idu ), have been waiting for their regular dose. Unfortunately, Algu returns empty hand. To their disappointment, Algu informs him about swarjists’s blocking everyone from buying liquor despite the presence of policeman there. Furious Munshi ji, gets up and decides to go to buy liquor by himself and asks his friends to accompany him. 

On the way to the liquor shop, they encounter two spiritual men, they were the respectable men of the society. Maulana Jamin, who was quite popular among the town members. Other was Swami Ghanananda, the founder of the Sewa Samiti ( service committee ) and a great well wisher of the people. They were reputed personalities and everyone respected them. 

The sight of two men standing on the way, made Rambali, Bechan, Jhinku and Idu shackle a bit. Maulana Jamin asked Idu, to go for the namaaz, while Swami Ghanananda offered ‘panchamrit’ to Rambali, Bechan, Jhinku and Munshi Ji. Getting embarrassed after their intrusion, they leave Munshi Ji in between. However,  Munshi ji further goes ahead and buys liquor despite the moral resistance, which two religious men offered.

Munshi Ji comes out after taking liquor, only to get humiliated by the public.

While the four friends of Munshi Ji walk together throwing away their bottles. During their walk, they converse with each other. During the conversation, they criticise Munshi Ji’s behaviour and talks how Maulana Jamin and Swami Ghanananda has helped them during various crises. 

They take the vow to never touch the liquor again. 

Once they reach Munshi Ji’s house, Munshi Ji tries to instigate them to have the sip of liquor. They remain undeterred and do not touch the glass. 

They leave altogether.

Munshi Ji put the glass to his lips, but before he could refill , his desire for drinking disappeared. It was the first time in his life that he had to drink alone. First he got irritated at his friends for leaving him in between. He recalls the insult and humiliation meted out to him, after he had bought the liquor from the shop. He recapitulates the entire incident and feels ashamed about it. His conscience compels him to end this weakness of his. At the final scene, he throws away the entire bottle and loud crashing sound was heard. 

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Atonement.

Atonement by Bhagwati Varma. Through the story, Varma had tried to depict various issues in a satirical manner. Beginning from the love and hate relationship for animals, he moved on to the targeting superstitious beliefs. 

It begins with the fight between Ramu’s wife and a cat Kabri. They both share a relationship of hatred. It can be seen in various instances, where Kabri is seen hindering the plans of Ravi’s wife. Kabri would end up eating everything, right from the cream, rabri, kheer to ghee. It would make Ravi’s wife hate her even more. Due to such occasional fiasco, Kabri was getting on her nerves. 

Ravi’s wife tried hard to catch her. She laid the traps for Kabri, with milk, cream, rats and everything dear to a cat’s heart were kept in the trap, but the Kabri did not even look at them.

After getting totally frustrated Ravi’s wife decides to finally finish off the cat. Ravi’s wife had a plan in her mind. A morning, a bowl full of milk was produced before the cat. While Kabri was busy in drinking her milk, Ravi’s wife came with a stick in her hand. And she finally hit the cat cautiously. Kabir neither moved nor made a sound, she just tumbled on its side. All the people, who were present in the house came hearing the sound. 

Ravi’s wife was accused as a sinner. 

The maid, termed it a very serious matter. 

The cook declared that killing a cat is equivalent to murdering a human being.  He refused to work until the Ravi’s wife has been atoned for her sin. He offered to call Pandit Ji, to which mother-in-law agreed. Mother-in-law further said that no one will eat or drink anything until her daughter in law atones for her sin.

The news of killing a cat spread like a fire. Everyone from the neighbours visited the home. She sat in the centre, with questions being thrown at her. 

There enters a prominent character in the story. Pandit Paramsukh is portrayed as a shrewd character, who is greedy, cunning and knows how to exploit the situation to the fullest. When he hears the news, he exactly knew what to do of it. He was four feet ten inches and the girth of his protruding belly was fifty-eight inches.

He starts his procedures, and after a deep phoney research into his scriptures, he claims that to atone the sin, the family need to donate a golden cat of exactly similar weight of the dead cat and apart from that he will be needing ten muns of wheat, one mun rice, one mun lentils, one mun sesame, five muns barley, five muns black gram, twenty sers ghee and also one mun salt. 

These all shocked the family members however were finally convinced.

The story took the dramatic turn when the maid said in faltering voice that cat had got up and run away.

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The Dumb People.

The Dumb People by Rangeya Raghav is story, delicate mix of sentimental feelings, emotionally charged development which altogether generate sympathetic feelings for the deaf and dumb boy.

That deaf and dumb boy who struggles to express his feelings, tries hard to speak, only to fail at last. It generates compassion among the viewers. Someone inquires about his uvula. He explains to them that while cleaning his throat, someone has cut his uvula. And now every time he tries to speak, he sounds like a wounded animal. He knows that he cannot hear anything. After expressing all these facts, he just plainly smiles. He was just outstanding in conveying his thoughts with the help of gestures.  He tells everyone that he has done all kinds of works at various places, like in sweetmeat shop, at someone’s home as servant.

Chameli develops sympathy for her. She is shown as a kind figure. She is compassionate towards underprivileged children, she wept when she saw the children of orphanage.  Deaf and dumb boy, explains to her that how he can do all the domestic works with just expressions. And Chameli offers him to live with him and he asks what he will get in return. They fix the deal at food and four rupees, to which the boy agrees readily.

The entire story showcases the sad melodies which cover the entire story, filled with melancholic vibes. The reader gets closely attached to the characters. The complete structure is a bit similar to the emotional tragedy, of lighter version. The incidents are linear and chained up, and filled with depressing emotions.

The deaf and dumb boy, goes out for a long time. Chameli is angry as well as anxious. Angry at his deeds and anxious for her safety. Her husband comments that he has run away, leaving them. He later returns. Chameli is furious at him and asks him, where he had been. The boy does not reply. She throws rotis at him. He did’t pick it up instantly but later eats it. Once he finishes eating his rotis, she goes to him with kitchen tongs in her hand. She further inquires about where he had been to which he had no reply. She hits him with the tong in his back. Tears fall from the eyes of Chameli and as well as of the boy. 

This had been his regular practice, he runs away from the house from time to time. 

There is one incident which welled up Chameli’s heart. Basanta, who is Chameli’s son had once hit the boy hard and in response to which the boy just cried, without reciprocating with violence. Chameli was in dilemma regarding how to deal with that. How could she punish her own son ? Can he be partial towards her son ? She imagines, how it had been, had his own son deaf and dumb ?

The boy is then accused of stealing valuable things from houses. She shouts at her. She demands answer but the boy just remains silent, failing to interpret her. And suddenly getting very angry, she pushes him out of the door. The boy walked away.

She regrets shouting at her, since he would be unavailable to hear any of it.

Hours later, Shakuntala and Basanta came running, and informs her about dumb boy. She finds her with blood covered all over her face howling like a dog. This scene is metaphorically significant as it depicts the courage of dumb boy who refuses to bow down to the bullies. He fights those boy with adamant courage. 

Later, Chameli is seen admiring dumb people’s voice against the oppression. She finally wonders, that aren’t we all are dumb or act like dumb ? Aren’t we all are dumb in one way or other ? We all are not happy with the society, it’s ways and system yet we choose not to raise our voice and get engaged in the web of illusory, artificial happiness ?

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The Wrestler’s Drum.

Phanishwarth Renu’s begins the story with a intense and sadistic depiction of village which is plagued by numerous shortcomings, such as cholera, malaria. The choice of words can leave the reader spellbound and attracts them to be the part of it. The scene portraying howling of foxes and terrifying hooting of the owl, gives a very depressed view of the village. 

The only positive thing which radiates the positivity in such gloomy atmosphere is wrestler’s drum. The wrestler is Luttan Singh. He is a popular local wrestler of the town. His parents had died when he was only nine. He got married. His widowed mother in law brought him up. Villagers tormented his mother-in-law in various ways . Luttan Singh began exercising and took up the wrestling to avenge those insults.

At the Shyamnagar fair, when he saw wrestler’s fighting. He couldn’t control himself. A dominating wrestler Chand Singh was in the ring, who was famous with his name ‘tiger’s son’. Chand Singh had come from Punjab. His guru was Badal Singh. He had remained undefeated through out all the bouts. 

Raja Sahib of Shyamnagar, who was an ardent fan of wrestling, was discussing whether he should admit Chand Singh to his court or not. Very next moment Luttan Singh challenged the ‘tiger’s son’ in the bout. 

The fight began between both the contestants. Initially, Chand Singh was completely dominating Luttan Singh in the initial phase. Luttan Singh was helpless.

Raja Sahib ordered to stop the match in between. He offered Luttan Singh a ten rupee note, and asked him to enjoy the fair, and go home afterwards.  Luttan Singh pleaded, and begged him to let him fight. Finally, Raja Sahib gave in and the fight resumed. 

Public supported Chand Singh. People were cheering for him. Luttan had no support except the sound of drum. Luttan was in the clutches of Chand Singh. Inspired with the beats of drum, Luttan Singh is finally able to cut his grip and free himself from his clutches. 

Public support poured in for Luttan. Raja Sahib not only hugged him but also made him, his court wrestler. 

The Luttan Singh enjoyed the free run, defeating various eminent writers like Kala Khan. 

The Luttan Singh married and had two children. Both boys were muscular and were inclined towards wrestling. They were declared as future court wrestlers.

The Maharaja died.

The new heir came. He abolished wrestling and brought new sports. Luttan Singh knew that he had now no place in the court. 

The village is again struck with plague. The situation got worse and both of his son, died soon.

He continued playing his drum. Drum was inspiration. It was his teacher.

Next night, he was found dead. Fox had eaten some of his parts.

His body was burnt, with drum lay nearby.

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The Ruffian :

Mohan Rakesh’s The Ruffian is a magical story filled with numerous sentiments, emotional attachments, parting pain, and abhorrence to the physical world. On one hand, it builds the love for nature with the depiction of various components of nature, on the other hand it portrays the cruelty and selfishness of the physical world. At some point of time, it appears that Mohan Rakesh has tried to compare the two distinct poles, one is motherly selfless nature and other is world who finds logic and rationality in everything, with utter selfish motives.

The writer begins with the portraying a beautiful picture of Chaupati beach. Mohan Rakesh writes about the boy, who wanders aimlessly in the beach, he kicks a few coconut, he stumbles upon a beggar getting some swore words from beggar. 

Boy is of thirteen or fourteen years, with dark features, that writers specifically mention that, is not categorised as beautiful.

The writer talks about the darkness that surround the beach. The beach is the place  where he encounters several kinds of people. He met a Parsee family. The male asks him to carry the child to Sheetal Bagh ( name of the place ), and in return he promises to give some money. To which the boy refuses to comply with.  The reason for not agreeing to Parsee, was that he was hooked to a game with a girl of fifteen or sixteen year old, with dupatta wrapped tightly around her waist. The Parsee man called him ‘an arrogant bastard and bloody scoundrel’ for ignoring his repeated pleas. 

The ball throwing game finished. The ball gets thrown towards the sea by the girl, to which the girl exclaims with ‘oh’. To catch the ball, the boy rushed towards the sea. He ran calf-deep into the sea and caught the ball before it was carried away by the receding wave, although it had grown dark. 

The middle aged of the girl’s family compliments him, saying that ‘he has a very sharp eye’. The girl agreed with the man. In response to which the boy just gave out a weak laugh. The woman in the family asked him to carry their things, to which boy agreed.

The writer depicts the plain human psychology, the ‘likeness’ factor, the affection towards few people make us do the things even if don’t want to do it, just for the sake for remaining close to the people whom we tend to like. The boy had unconsciously develops feeling for her, even though he is aware of the fact that she will remain there momentarily. But, hope is a good thing.

The woman asks him to wash plates and spoons, which were six in numbers, i.e. six plates and six spoons. He does that religiously, with utmost care and dedication. While serving the family the plates and spoons, the woman finds out that one of the spoon was missing. The boy is accused of stealing the spoon. The boy defends himself by saying that he has not stolen anything.

The woman asks his husband to check his pocket. The boy refuses to allow them to check his pockets. Going indifferent, the checking begins.  The man finds nothing except a copper amulet, few guavas, and sea shells. 

The copper amulet was given by her mother, who is dead now. 

The emotions which were attached to the amulet has been taken away. 

He is sad. He is lonely. He is again in the beach. He has nothing but the grudge inside him.

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