MY PERENNIAL LIGHTHOUSE!

MY PERENNIAL LIGHTHOUSE!

(THE FIRST PAGE OF MY TEACHER’S DIARY)

-Padmavathi Neelamraju

1987 was an exciting year of my life when I finally took up a job after completing my university studies. I received an appointment letter from HCM Junior College in our hometown as a junior lecturer. It was a proud moment for my mother, she said funnily smiling, “If she were a boy, she could have a good demand in the groom's market”, I know it is what she wanted to be identified with in her life. Now she found her wish fulfilment in me.

At 9 o’clock in the morning I went to the college to report.

When I Entered the Principal’s room, I was so thrilled to see one of my father’s acquaintances Mr. Raju, accountant cum PA to the Principal. He also saw me and followed me calling my name.

“Are you that little one who did so many dance performances in school functions?” it's great!
wow! You joined as a lecturer! Good! Good!”

“Go to Mrs. Rajeswari madam,” I looked at him for clarification. “That lady,your S.St teacher,
now she is vice-principal.’

“Oh! Rajeswari ma’am !” wonder in my eyes.

“Yes!”

“Where can I meet her.?”

“Go to the staff room, first floor of this building”. I know the staff room. When I was a student I never dared to enter it. That may be because of fear or respect for teachers. I climbed up the stairs, trembled, not because of fear but of excitement. But there was nobody, the familiar scene of “an idol of Mother Mary” in a glass box. I heard footsteps of somebody coming into the staff room. There entered a lady, an apple of the students’ eyes. Fair,very slim and beautiful! She is Ms. Rajeswari. Now she seemed to have elderly dignity with the same pretty looks. I observed “is she married, when?”

When I left the school, she was unmarried and heard that she would remain so. I stood up with
reverence.

“Oh no! Don’t stand. Now you are my colleague”, she smiled typically. “I am very proud of
you. You did post graduation.  Now you joined here as Jr. lecturer in your school only, great!”, she patted my shoulder. “You can stand on your own feet,” she murmured. This time I found a sort of grief in her voice. “At least, we can stand on our own feet when things go wrong in life.”

I saw a shade of sadness on her face.

She handed over my time table and instructed me to take classes from the next day.

I left with a thought, “why did she look so upset?”

I told my mom,” Mom, I met Rajeswari madam. Did she get married?”

“What!” a surprise look.

Then she said that she got married. ”oh! I see! I heard some unusual circumstances forced her
to marry.”

“What circumstances?” It was my turn to be surprised. My mom told me something which I
could not believe.

“You know my dear! It is very difficult in our society for a girl to get married, if she is good in
education and earning better. That is more difficult. Boys feel more incompatible if the girl is more qualified. Parents doubt her individuality. Society has its own perception conveniently changing at trending circumstances.”  I felt my mom was telling me a riddle. “Mom, tell me clearly…”  I said with an irritating upset tone.

She continued, “Rajeswari is your father’s lawyer friend’s sister, advocate Kodandapani at
district court, very rich. Her richness, her education have become an objection to many. Because girls of her kind who were well educated who went to university, found them in a typical social problem.”
I understood. She was some twenty years older than me. By then very few girls have access to go to universities to study post graduation. B A is ok.  PUC / SSLC are fine for a girl to get married.

Mom prolonged, “Rajeswari could not get married in spite of many match making
propositions. She didn’t like some, some didn’t like her. Thus time passed away. She got a job
in HCM as a teacher.

She was appointed on special duty to fulfil the formalities to bring affiliation to school from
Board of Intermediate, to start Junior college. That time she was frequently accompanied by Raju to Hyderabad. I don’t know the truth, but rumours spread that she was ruining the family of Raju and married him. He was already married, had a 16 year old son and a 13 year old daughter. His wife, Venkatalakshmi, not so bright by nature, a village bread girl.”

“But Mom! Did you believe all these?”

“Not so. But I felt surely the circumstances must have forced her to do so. Such a pretty and
educated woman!” sympathetically she said, “Nobody has any sympathy for her, but showered
all their concerns for Raju’s family. Unfortunately it is the fault of the girl only”.

“A gossip spread that she was having an affair with Raju. But I never believed it”

“I felt people didn't see the advantage taken by Raju, but doubted Rajeswari's chastity.
Nobody questioned him why he accepted the proposal, being a married man. But she was forced to prove her sanctity.”

“I know, he might be enjoying her riches,”

“I pity that girl … victimized for a social scandal and forced to become a second wife. She
had never been given that respect thereafter”.

That time women’s education was a debating point and everywhere everyone was talking in
support of women's education. But the society was not ready; people were still in those
perceptions that an educated girl cannot be a good wife or good bahu or a good mother”.

My sympathy for her but anger grew in my mind towards these sociological norms which
forced her to choose something against her will.

My mom thoughtfully said, “I am afraid of what music is in store for you.” I have seen fear in
her eyes. She added, “You don't worry. I never let you have that doom, “A motherly promise
to her beloved daughter.

***

          What music is in store for me? Fifty percent of my life runs around my mother. Remembering my mother, my perennial lighthouse to whom I always looked up to. She was the go-to person whenever faced with a decision whether it was my studies or my struggle. My mom’s act of daringness was a fresh memory when circumstances lead to withering my dignity. That was a cinematic story if I share.  I joined St. Theressa Junior College as a junior lecturer. I was the belle of the ball. Unexpectedly I received letters from a stranger proposing to me, later following me. But finally he started threatening me as I didn’t accept his proposal. It went on for a few months. I didn’t care for any of such warnings or threats.
That was a doomsday for me yet the bright Sun appeared early hours. I got up early and was filling municipal tap water in tubs and storing drinking water in pitchers in our backyard near the kitchen. Suddenly I heard somebody calling me in a whispering voice from the neighbour’s adjoining parapet wall. It was kamalakshi vadina. With an eerie look she said, “osey! Go fast out onto the street. There are so many pink colour papers! go fast!”.. She hurried me and ran in the same hurry out.

A chill passed on to my spine. I rushed. “Yes! Full of pink colour pamphlets fallen scattered
on the road…”I was stunned. My feet glued to the ground.

Kanthamma garu glared at me with a sarcastic smile. She was pumping water from a boring.
Suryanarayana babai opened one door of the main entrance, putting his head out of that narrowly opened door and looked at me with wide opened eyes and banged the door.

I wanted to move but could not. I am totally paralyzed. A puff of wind swung, the pink
papers went on and on floating in the air like the taunting words from the courtiers, tattering
the dignity of yajnaseni before infamous disrobing.

Thoughts swam over my mind making me upside down in that blowing of pink papers on
the road. It was her exceptional empathy and bravery that pushed her. She started collecting
all the pink papers… running in all directions of the street. She didn’t see who was there, who
was not! She collected a handful of pink papers and walked towards me, pulling me by holding my hand to go inside the house. There was absolute silence.

She passed a commanding look at everybody including my father. I followed my mom with
a bent head in shock silently into the kitchen.  She prepared coffee for me. My nana (father)
dared to enter the kitchen. She gave him a cup of coffee, spoke to him with a sigh and let him
not utter a single word to me.

Again Kamalakshi calling me from the parapet wall, my mom heard, roared,”Kamala! Quiet!
Shut your mouth! Go inside! Prepare breakfast for suryanarayana.” She left quietly.

Clock struck 8”, clock struck 9”, clock struck 10, I moved from where I had been seated In the kitchen. I was dumb and numbed. I didn't know how I had finished my bath and sat at my study table gazing at the pink papers in front of me.  Tears rolled down endlessly to wipe out the stains on my modesty… after a pink printed character assassination.

My mom stood behind me smoothly rubbing my head and said with quiet determination, “No
other option. Do what you want to do”.

I lifted up my eyes with all doubts and fears.

Strongly she said, “It is not your fault. It is phenomenal, for a girl … a weapon to weaken
her. Character assassination is the foremost tool to pull the woman down to earth.” She managed that devastating situation by herself with the same dignity and stood beside me in the fight to restore myself.

She was my confidence, my strength, my religion, MY PERENNIAL LIGHTHOUSE.

Whenever I come across Mother’s day, sadness envelops me for not winning that fight even
after a complaint, two years of court proceedings. I lost the case in court, because the court could not see any evidence of harm, done to me in the arguments of both the public prosecutor and the defence.  It was cancelled after one year of hearing the arguments. But it totally ignored the damage I had in this society under its long lasting impact. My mother told me, “I have understood that we could not get justice. But see the positive side of it. Nobody would dare to point out you for this in future. You have restored your dignity. For a woman’s dignity, it is always a battle where victory or justice seldom appears.”

*****