There was a time when our country was a colony of Britain and these days many colonies have come up in our country. It is another thing that these colonies are called housing colonies. Whether the colonies of Britain or of housing, the purpose of both is to trouble people.
Colony is that piece of land where many people gather and lead life like strangers this style of life is called in philosophy “Solitude in the crowd”. So long as man had not invented colonies, he used to limit his feet according to the length of the bed sheet. But now on seeing the length of bed sheet he adjusts the length of his feet. If he doesn’t do this, it becomes impossible for him to live in a colony. For example, after the third child, we didn’t produce the fourth child because we were living in a single room of a colony. A quarter is called a single room quarter where in an area of ten feet by ten feet, all the activities and all the wishes of a family have to be adjusted. The advantage of enclosing a river into a goblet is that the relations between the children and the parents develop in a brotherly way. The word privacy is found in the dictionary. To me, the future of this word seems to be very disappointing. If housing colonies continue to develop, rapidly in this way, it will disappear from the dictionary altogether. Even today I feel it difficult to make our children understand the meaning of this word. They frequently ask me “Daddy, tell us where does the privacy go?” In response to this question, I can only gaze my wife with questioning looks. This is the reason that children living in single room quarters attain puberty much before their age. This is called living in the least possible period of time.
When I was a child, colonies had not developed so much. Every man used to live in the house of his choice and he used to work according to his will and pleasure and no body used to get any information. My father’s house was so big that it had 20 rooms and there were toilets and bathrooms at various places. Every child used to have a separate room. Every room had separate windows. Even after this, there were four or five rooms surplus. Look at our innocence. We used to complain to our mother quite aften, “Mummy, in a big house like this, everybody has a separate room. Even the dog is kept in a separate room. If it is not the cruelty of daddy, what is it then that he compels you to live in his room only. You should also get a separate room”. In response to it, my mom used to laugh at me and she used to keep quiet and she used to feel happy in her heart that God has blessed her with such an innocent child. This was our condition and on the other hand the condition of our colony affected progeny is such that whenever there is any conflict between me and my wife, they not only make us aware of the secret of a good homely life but on certain occasions, as a referee, they decide our victory and defeat also. As a result, this single room quarter is that whenever we want to fight on a certain issue, we very quietly go to a park and come back home after the fight, but his has gone to the notice of our neighbours. One of my friends asked me the day before yesterday “Brother, did you and your wife fight again on a certain matter because I saw you both again in the park yesterday”.
While continuing life in one room, the mental status of the person also becomes like a room. He becomes so narrow minded that the entire world, looks to him ten feet by ten feet. God forbid, whenever I enter a vast room or a large house, I don’t know why I feel suffocated. If feels as if my breath would stop. Not only this, my habits have also become like a room. For example, we the people of chandrapore colony are habituated to fold our legs while sleeping. It means that we fold our legs to such an extent that they get closer to our forehead while sleeping. The advantage of sleeping in this manner is that there will be a lot of space for keeping other household appliances and all the members of the family can sleep conveniently adopting the posture as adopted by you. If you provide me an opportunity of sleeping alone in a room of forty by forty feet dimension, I will sleep in the same way folding my feet. Someone has rightly said, “habit is the worst thing”.
But the life of the colony is a different world altogether. The laws of nature here are different. The sun here is different, the moon is different, the season is also different. For example, the sum of the colony won’t rise. Till the time when the cough of our neighbour Mr. Sharma doesn’t start without giving a prior warning. Until he does not inhale breath after expectorating two or three times. My children think that the sum rises from the throat of Mr. Mishra. This is the routine for the past so many years. The moment, Mr. Mishra Coughed, the sun lifted its head from the other side. After sometimes when I hear the sound of hissing of a snake suddenly and later of killing it, I realize that it is seven O’ clock and the water tap of our neighbour’s house has been opened. His servant maid has not only come but she has also started washing clothes. In this way it struck 7 O’clock of the colony.
I always fear from 8 O’clock, because at the stroke of 8 the wife of another neighbour Mr. Verma, slaps strongly on the cheeks of her only son. The meaning of this slap is that her young one will now go to school. The slap is beaten exactly at 8 O’ clock and the child reaches his school exactly half an hour later. You might not have experienced such a rigorous slap. There is a relationship established in slap. On one day at 8 O’ clock, the young one complained to his mother “Mummy, it is 8 O’clock and I have to reach the school on time and you haven’t slapped me yet. I won’t be responsible if I reach the school late”. Immediately after this, a loud sound of slap in echoed in the atmosphere and the child proceeded to school.
Now see, there is a knocking on the door. It means that it is 8 O’ clock now and Lallaji’s tooth brush came upto the door and now our tooth brush has to go to the door. Lalaji lives on the first floor and I on the fourth. For the past so many months it has become a routine that exactly at quarter past eight, Lalaji sends his tooth brush to me. It is my duty to put toothpaste on it. Incidentally, on a certain day, our toothpaste was exhausted. When Lallaji’s toothbrush came to us, we sent a message that I don’t have toothpaste, I saw that the condition of the toothpaste is very bad. Some one must have opened it. I chided my child. He, then told me, “I had brought the toothpaste but Lallaji took out his share of toothpaste out of it snatching the toothpaste tube from my hands”.
However, anything can happen in this world but the routine of this colony won’t change. At the stroke of ten, the scene becomes worth seeing, when the babus come out of their houses and they walk on the road. Their wives bid farewell to their husbands waiving their hands from their balconies. This is the only occasion, where there is smile on the faces of women of the colony. Various Mona Lisas when they jointly waive their hands to bid farewell to their husbands, it becomes difficult to identify which Mona Lisa is bidding farewell to whom. After this, there is a silence in the colon. Now and then, there echoes the voice of the street vendors. “Empty bottles, empty boxes”. At this juncture, I express pity on the innocence of the street vendor that he doen’t know that empty bottles have already gone to offices long back, only their labels are left out in their houses.
The day of the colony is spent in a deserted atmosphere like this. When it strikes five o’clock, the wave of life passes through the life of the colony once again.
This is the time when the social life of the inhabitants of the colony starts. On your way back home you may meet everyone at the bus stop but it is very brief and calculated. Lalafi has been meeting me for the past ten years. In these ten years, he has asked me only one question which is this, “How are you?” Sometimes, despite my ill health, I responded by saying “I am quite alright” because I know that Lallaji is not asking this question to enquire about my health but he is asking this question for the sake of asking a question. I meet Mr. Khalid everyday on the bus which brings us back home. The beauty of his is, he suffers from a new ailment everyday and by the time I reach home he tells me all the details of his ailment with its minute points. There is another person. He asks me “in which class are your children studying?” The life of the colony revolves around these few questions.
The night of the colony is very pleasant. I listen to the radio of my neighbour till the late hours of night. Whether the radio programme is good or bad, he reaches the window and stands at the angle of 45 degrees and watches the T.V. programmes that are going on in the house of Mr. Mukherjee on the T.V. At ten O’clock in the night the wife of Lallaji gives the last warning to her children. “I have been telling since 7 O’clock to sleep and you have been still making a noise.” And the children say, “How can we get sleep due to the sound of your continuous warnings if you keep quiet, we will sleep”.
And then, night descends gradually on the colony and people sleep folding their feet. But before sleeping, their last wish is “May God keep mishraji in good health and in tact so that he could get up in the morning and cause the sun to rise with his cough. Sometimes, there occurs a fear that if the cough of Mishraji stops, what will happen to all of us? What will happen of that sun which takes out its head after listening to the sound of his cough. (An old writing).