Parliamental

1

#EpicWin

‘Ay Raghav, ye ikde. Come here, take a selfie with us!’

Two men draped in the colours of the Rashtrawadi Janata Manch – bright saffron headbands and flags of the same hue, with a closed-fist symbol – had been trying to take a selfie for the past ten minutes.

‘What yaa! You must’ve taken thirty pics and you’re still not satisfied?’ asked Guy Number One, clearly irritated.

Guy Number Two looked at him seriously and responded, ‘That’s why I am calling Raghav! You see how fair-skinned he is? It’ll give good contrast in the picture. We need to make this good enough to get tweeted by the official party! Oi Raghav! Come.’

Ye ikde: Come here. A Marathi term usually used by mothers to summon their kids angrily. ‘Ye ikde and do your homework, Cheeku!’

Raghav reluctantly walked towards the two party workers whose names he didn’t know. They were just two among the hundred other karyakartas he had been working with for the past three weeks. This entire blob of humanity was now eagerly waiting for their newly elected member of Parliament to emerge from his residence. It was time for the victory rally. As the party leader had instructed them a short while ago over video, ‘PAINT THE TOWN SAFFRON! Scream! Shout! Tell everyone! Don’t let anyone in the town take their afternoon naps! RJM is BACK and we’re not going anywhere!’

Guy Number Two judged the latest selfie with a scrunched-up face. Raghav, who was also draped in the same party gear as these two gentlemen, looked tired. There were dark circles under his eyes and he had grown a light stubble on his face – something his mom absolutely hated. She said it made him look like his dad.

‘Tag me also, okay?’ said Guy Number One. ‘What’s your Twitter handle, Raghav? I’ll share this in the party WhatsApp group so that they can post it. You’ll get a lot of followers! Tell tell.’

‘@Arnavinator,’ mumbled Raghav.

‘What?’

‘@A-R-N-A-V-I-N-A-T-O-R.’

‘Who’s Arnav?’

‘My dad.’

Karyakartas: Political party workers who are swept away by the belief that a particular political leader will be their salvation.

‘Your dad?’

‘Yes. My dead fucking dad.’

Guy Number One looked awkwardly at the selfie. ‘Erm … okay then. Sending it to the party group.’

Srikar stepped out of his house, shading his eyes from the harsh sunlight. Feeling the bile rise again, he rushed back inside to the closest washroom and projectile-vomited into the pot.

Rohini stormed in, shaking her head. ‘Aah fuck. Ugh. Again, Srikar? Again?’

Srikar just stared into the pot, feeling a bit dizzy.

‘I told you. I said you won’t be able to handle all this but you didn’t listen only. Now look what has happened. You actually won! Who would’ve thought you’d win, huh? Not me. Even you didn’t think you’d have a chance! I was praying to Ganpati Bappa so you’d lose, but even God is not on our side.’

‘Shut up, Rohini. For the hundredth time … I am just … nervous,’ Srikar told his wife, while staring at the half-digested khichdi in the pot. ‘I think I’ll just skip the rally. Why do I have to do a victory rally anyway?’

The phone in Rohini’s hand chimed. She unlocked it, looked at the screen for a moment, frowned and turned it towards Srikar.

‘That’s why,’ she said. ‘For these idiots.’

The screen showed an image of three young karyakartas draped in the party colours, two of them making a ‘V’ sign and smiling widely. The third one just looked bored. It had been tweeted from the party’s official handle.

‘Hey, isn’t that the neighbour’s kid? The sad-looking one?’ asked Srikar.

Rohini looked at the photo again. ‘Oh yes. That’s Raghav… Or … uh … @Arnavinator on Twitter.’ She let out a chuckle. ‘Kid has a dark sense of humour using his dad’s name like that.’

Srikar chuckled back. ‘Well, his dad did suck. You know I hated him. Actually, a lot of people did.’

‘He better be grateful for what we did for him and his family,’ Rohini muttered sharply under her breath.

It didn’t seem like Srikar had heard her. With a giant sigh, he got up and walked outside, closely followed by her. The guards opened the front gates, drums started beating, karyakartas lost their shit and started dancing wildly, gulaal was thrown in the air and a few motorcycles randomly hit their accelerators on the spot for no particular reason, creating a deafening ugly engine sound.

Shouts of ‘Prabhu Srikar amar rahe! Long live Prabhu Srikar!’ went up.

Srikar looked around amidst the chaos and started feeling pukish again. ‘Oh shit. Not again. Not here,’ he thought, panicking as the journalists started clicking photographs wildly.

‘SHIT SHIT SHIT…’

Gulaal: Dry powdered colour used during the festival of Holi or political rallies, often by men as an excuse to touch the girl they like or the political leader they support, respectively.

Amar rahe: A chant wishing someone to remain immortal. Like a god, but without the powers.

A body suddenly appeared right in front of him. The fresh bout of khichdi-puke fell onto it.

The person held Srikar’s shoulders to steady him and said in a shaky voice, ‘Uhh … congratulations … sir?’

Srikar looked up at Raghav, whose shirt was spotted with vomit, shaking and extremely shocked.

‘Don’t react. Walk away calmly into my house,’ he whispered. ‘It’s okay. You just saved me from a disaster. Give me your headband.’

Raghav quickly took off his saffron headband and handed it over. ‘Thank … you,’ said Srikar, coughing and wiping away flecks of khichdi from the corner of his mouth.

Raghav nodded and shakily walked away towards Srikar’s house, trying really hard not to reveal his puke-covered front to anyone. Srikar, meanwhile, was engulfed by a crowd of journalists shoving microphones in his face and clicking pictures. A cascade of questions was hurled at him. ‘Srikarji, how do you feel… Are you surprised that you won… Are you shocked… Did Moreyji call to congratulate you…?’

‘Hey Deva. Hey Ganesha. What have you done, Srikar?’ whispered Rohini into his ear.

‘I don’t know. I’m so very screwed,’ blurted out Srikar.

Raghav walked through the front gates of Srikar’s mansion without a glitch. The security guards were busy trying to keep the journalists away from their boss. ‘Srikar will probably have to expand his security team now that he’s a member of Parliament,’ thought Raghav.

Instead of going into the house, the front door of which was wide open, he took a detour and entered the side lawns. He moved towards the boundary wall, scaled it and jumped across into his house. Compared to Srikar’s two-storeyed mansion, freshly whitewashed, Raghav’s house was a single-storeyed two BHK, yellowing, paint cracking away with abandon.

‘Arre deva! What is this, Raghav?’ exclaimed his mother the moment he stepped into the house. She was watching a national news channel, which was showing the scenes outside Srikar’s house. An excited news anchor was shouting, ‘… this is an unexpected victory which has caught all the political pandits by surprise! Prabhu Srikar was the least likely candidate to win, according to exit polls, and now RJM has made a comeback in the city of Nagpur… Given the recent scandals that hit the party, nobody would have imagined a situation like this…’

Raghav shook his head.

‘Maa, you do know that you can just step outside and watch all this nonsense with your own eyes, right?’

‘But this is on a national news channel! Look! You can see our house too! See!’

In the background, you could spot a coconut tree. ‘You can see our tree. Not the house.’

‘I swear they showed it! Aai shappat!’ she swore and looked at Raghav again. ‘What happened to you? Why are you like this? Why is your shirt so dirty? What were you up to?’

Arre deva: ‘Oh God! Y U DO THEES?’

Aai shappat: Swearing on your mother and hoping she doesn’t die because of a random lie you’ve told.

‘Nothing. Just a small accident. Spilled something on myself,’ muttered Raghav, moving towards his room while removing his puke-splattered shirt and throwing it in the corner. His wiry, sparsely hairy chest felt especially violated after the incident.

Raghav jumped into the shower just as his mother rushed into his room, yelling, ‘Don’t throw your clothes around like this, boy! What am I ever going to do with you, you useless fellow!’

He turned on the shower to hear a short gust of air. ‘Great. No water. Just great.’

‘Maa! Didn’t you turn on the pump?’ he shouted.

‘The pump is broken again. I was waiting for you to come back so that you can fix it! There’s a bucket of water in there. Use that.’

Raghav sighed and started rubbing himself violently with whatever little water he could find.

‘Raghav, listen,’ his mother said from outside. ‘I was thinking you should go to Delhi.’

The mug slipped from Raghav’s hand and fell with a clattering sound. ‘What? Why?’

‘Srikarji won because of your hard work. I think he would appreciate it if you helped him more in Delhi.’

Raghav whipped his damp towel from the back of the door, wrapped it around himself and pushed the door open. ‘What is the matter with you?! I hate this! No way I’m doing that. No bloody way.’

‘But Raghav … you’re good at this…’

‘No.’

‘But you promised…’

‘I promised to help with the elections, not what happens after it.’

His mom bustled around, cleaning his room. That was her default mode whenever she wasn’t sure of herself. ‘Srikarji is a good man. He will value you and your qualification. Who else is going to give you a job?’

Raghav got dressed silently and stalked off to the living room. ‘I’m hungry. Do we have anything to eat?’

The television kept blaring. It showed Srikar sticking out of the sunroof of his bright red Chevrolet Optra, waving to the crowd. ‘…What an unexpected victory… Anant Morey has clearly pulled a fast one on the voters of Nagpur… His political acumen is simply unmatched…’

Raghav switched off the television, flopped down on the sofa, propped open a worn-out copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and resumed reading.

For the sixteenth time.

Sunita Marathe had been through a lot and her son was not helping with the situation. At all.

After her husband, Arnav, had passed away, drinking himself to death, she had no idea what to do with life. With a teenage son, no job, no future prospects and no real skills, besides being the wife of a disgraced man, she felt that killing herself would be better.

Her neighbours, Rohini and Prabhu Srikar, had come to her rescue. Prabhu gave her a job in his coaching academy as a receptionist and helped her pay for Raghav’s school and college education. Rohini supported her throughout the ordeal and became her emotional crutch.

Sunita owed them a debt. A debt that had to be paid by Raghav.

She watched him devour chapatis and baingan bharta while reading on the side.

‘Raghav, listen. Put the book away for a while and talk to me.’

Raghav sighed, folded the corner of the page he was reading and shut the book. Without looking at her, he continued gulping down his food. Sunita took his book, opened the page, undid the fold and closed it again.

‘I told you I don’t like you doing that to books. Treat them nicely.’

Raghav rolled his eyes. ‘What will I do in Delhi?’

Sunita brightened up a little. She knew that her son had actually enjoyed working on Prabhu Srikar’s election campaign. He had helped the RJM draft Srikar’s speeches without getting any real credit for it. But even he knew that their little family owed Srikar everything.

‘See, you are the only person around who can write proper English. Srikarji will value your skills. He will find some use for you in Delhi,’ she said, scooping some more bharta into his plate.

Chapatis: Take some flour, mix it with water, knead away. Then use a circular roller type object to flatten it and watch as it turns into the map of Australia. Put it on a stove and watch it burn. Disappointed, ask your mom to make it.

Baingan bharta: Delicious roasted brinjal mush mixed with other delicious stuff. Bharta means mush, not to be confused with Bharat, which is a country.

Raghav chewed slowly, thinking. ‘But I don’t know anything about Parliament. Why would he keep me?’

‘Do you think even Prabhuji knows anything about Parliament?’ she chuckled. ‘Rohini was telling me how he’s so nervous about the whole job. Both of them have no clue what an MP is supposed to do in that big round building.’

She saw her son’s eyes glow a little. ‘Really?’

‘Really. I feel you can help him understand his work better. I think having a familiar face around would be good for Srikarji. You know what a gentle soul he is.’

‘But he doesn’t even know me…’

‘Wait.’ Sunita got up, walked over to retrieve her mobile phone and made a call.

‘Namaste Rohiniji… I saw you on TV… This is such a proud moment for all of us… Yes, yes … I wanted to meet you… Raghav is interested in helping Prabhuji with his work in Delhi…’

Raghav got up and rushed to his mother. ‘Maa, what are you doing!? I haven’t said yes!’

She shooed him away.

‘Yes, yes… We’ll both drop by in the evening… Oh, there’s a party? All right … no, no, we don’t want to intrude … you’re big people now … all right, we’ll come… See you in the evening.’

Sunita disconnected the call and looked at Raghav. ‘Iron your kurta. The one you wore for your graduation. We’ve