PRAY FOR THEM

PRAY FOR THEM

I can't really tell you how much of a joy I experience when I reach my house at Trivandrum, especially relieved from the mechanical life in armed force where laughing in front of subordinates is considered a taboo.  Here, you are the ultimate boss and the subordinate. No answers to be given to anyone.
 Many may differ and think otherwise. Their prerogative...!
Amused to see the life can be lived like this too, the only think I hate to keep in mind is the date I booked my ticket for my return journey. Waking by to the old melodic Ayyappa songs from a nearby Devi temple, morning walk up to Museum, lazy news reading by sipping a glass full of green tea in the cool balcony amidst fragrance of fresh jasmine flowers, Oh God! Is this the feeling all my colleagues irrespective of their badges in the shoulder have, when they are on their earned leave?

Waiting for my son’s school bus at Pattom junction gives me much fascination. Not because it provides me any reminiscence of my 'nothing much to boast' school days, but that’s the time, at 7 ‘O’ clock, I could see how life starts afresh in my native place.  Morning flocks of birds, news paper boys rocketing upon the by-lanes in cycles, old folk with incantations on their lips, rushing to the temple before the ‘deeparadhana’ starts, cool morning breeze free of carbon monoxide; No doubt, it’s always been spectacular to walk down few yards to the bus point holding the tender hand of my son and answering his curious little questions.  “Can a ‘Monster truck’ jump across a coconut tree?”,  “What if a rocket and a Kerala road transport corporation bus collides?” He genuinely knew to which question he has to demand an answer and which not. A sharp look at him with a smile and a smile in return from him acts as a memorandum of understanding between us.  But for a serious question, he expects a clear and specific answer which sometimes I put on pending, to be given later when he return back from school. Google search engine or an encyclopedia helps me out in this. It is now rather a practice for me, giving relief to his mother and grandfather from their routine duty, whenever Iam on leave to take my son to his bus point. The hidden agenda is to spend maximum time as possible with him before my leave comes to an end. An Indian armed force member spends only few more than two months with his family in a year, the plight they willfully entered by signing the oath.

We normally get almost ten minutes at the bus point and sometimes even more depends on how quick he took his breakfast. His questions, many times revolve around the popular kiddo characters for which my answers will always be the smile and that sharp look. ‘Do you think Chotta Bheem can take an Ostrich egg in one go? , ’What if the 'Transformers' got angry with the 'Skyline Apartment?’.  He knew and expects not much from his police father in these topics.

Today something different happened at the bus point. It was me who had started the session. I found two stray dogs hastily crisscrossing the Pattom-Plamoodu road which is one such straight road, a rarity in my city, where vehicles run at higher speeds.  The dogs indeed gave me few tense moments till they settle down the other side of the road as I genuinely feared a speeding motorcyclist coming from Palace junction met with a terrible collision with one among these stupid dogs, right in front of me.  I thought my gesticulations in shooing away the dogs might have been proven effective in sending them to the other side of the road, but got it wrong when I found the real reason for them crossing the road was something different. They had found some eatables there. As mangos are not to be included in the list of their favorite food, they left disappointed. Probably been thrown out by a crazy child through the window of a night plying bus or car when he found it ammonia ripe, the mango rests there waiting for an herbivorous animal to consume it. Both dogs did what they could do to their best to make it clean. They licked it thoroughly and left.

‘Can an insane man really recognize his mother?’  Question from my son bought me back from the dogs and the mango. I was sure that he might have seen an insane somewhere. It didn’t take much time for me to spot a lunatic on the other side of the road wearing a shirt too big for his lean body, shabby and long haired, acting in sub human manner, muttering something, much to resemble a primate.

What happened next was indeed shocking for me. He jumped out of the foot path and ran down the street to pick up the leftover mango and started eating it as if he was too weak from hunger. He was feasting on it. Shaking his head in gratitude and laughing incessantly, he finished the mango in no time by sitting on the foot path.

Now that I have to give an answer to my son, I sighed. No definite answers in my mind, I felt bemused. If there is anyone in the world, one could easily discern and recognizes instantaneously among millions would be their mother.  Here, right in front of me, a man who can no longer be treated as such since he could not recognize his mother or in that sense nobody exists for him in the world, sitting alone smiling, not conscious of him or others. He has no knowledge of what happened or happening to him. Living in hallucinations and delusions and would never be considered as a part of normal society. Are they be treated as evils? Are their wide opened eyes to be scared of? I always felt dejected whenever I see a mentally retarded person in misery.
I still remember an incident happened few years ago, somewhere in my city, during a ‘Harthal day’. Few police men were dispersing an illegally assembled crowd near legislative building by resorting to lathy charge. They cornered a man in his thirties who was  reluctant to flee from the spot. Only after several blows were taken with a smile in his face, could the policemen noticed something fishy with this poor man. He was an insane, accidently trapped in there. Badly injured, he was taken to the hospital with that smile still intact in his face.
 During my tenure in Rapid Action Force and also in CRPF, I always insisted upon my troops to not to hurt any mentally retarded person who accidently, got into the scuffle, but help them to a safe place free of trouble.

Being insane is one terrible state of affair, rejected from the main stream society and left aloof from even the closest relatives. But, as god willed, there are still alive few noble hearts taking care of them at various rehabilitation centers, by giving them the only two basic requirements they need. Food and Care. Let us support them.