Scenes from a Coerced Sterilization
Amy Olassa
1.
The year is 1976. A State of Emergency arrests the Nation. Fundamental rights suspended. Newspapers and all other media censored, information and news clogged. And in the country’s southernmost State, the Naxal movement is on the rise. Police stations attacked, young men arrested for their political views, tortured, killed. The nature of resistance matches the nature of governance.
Young Appu studies a calendar for 1973, laminated and soiled, discarded by its original owner, re-employed in Appu’s home as wall art. But 1973 was a different time, he was only seven years old, too young to know. His pond is smaller, as is his home and his troubles. He does not comprehend the larger battles of his State or the Nation. He’s worried about his mother. It is the fifth day of a high fever and his mother, who is mute, has become entirely indecipherable, her gestures and moans so altered, that Appu cannot understand what she says.
This morning he moved her mat close to the doorway of their house. From where she lies, she can see more than the red brick walls, the calendar that hangs from a nail in the wall, and the ceiling of dry brown palm leaves. She can listen to the tempered sound of an announcement made from the far bank of the river. She can watch the stream and the path that cuts alongside the water, and she can wait for the boat shop to go by, packed with clear plastic drums filled with boiled sweets and snacks and wooden racks of glass bangles, magazines and mirrors from which sunlight bounces off, things they cannot afford to purchase.
When all is silent outside, not a passing boat, no neighbors out on errands, carrying news or village gossip, not even a grazing cow, Appu’s mother, named Thankam with no surname, turns to watch him set a dented pot on the wood stove of their little house. He is her youngest son and as she watches him, time seems to her both essential and inconsequential.
Ten monsoons have passed since the boy’s birth. Appu, her solace, came seven weeks too soon, at an early hour, well before dawn. A scrawny infant, only his cheeks were bulbous, burnt red tomatoes. His cheeks are still round, but his straight hair has turned into frizzy curls that feel like rough coconut husk. The tan of his skin has deepened with each passing year. Not wheat-ish like her eldest son, not like her second who looks like he has been doused in rust-colored tea, or her third whose complexion is just like hers, even and light, despite all the hours she spends in the sun. At least, this is how they appeared the last time she saw those rascals. For them the house was a temporary home, she a temporary caregiver who nourished them until they toddled on their feet, eventually running away, already familiar with the way out. The last time she saw them, her three sons had looked so skinny, like fleeting shadows. Those boys inherited their fathers’ qualities, none of hers. They are little animals—they will grow up to be scoundrels, criminals, maybe worse.
Appu starts a fire in the stove. He rouses it, blowing through a broken pipe, an object he uses for only this purpose. When he has done what he can, he sits back and looks at his mother. She points at his nose by touching her own and he knows he has soot on his face. He shuffles close to her and wraps a palm on her forehead and she shivers under the single sheet they own, a ripped mundu. There is nothing more he can do while the rice cooks. So he leaves her to rest and goes to the stream to wash dirty clothes.
His older brothers find him. They are loud in the company of their unruly friends, who spend whole days plummeting into the river and rowing an old boat punched with many holes. They take turns taunting Appu so someone is always working at emptying the boat: “He’s not a he,” they sing, in between scooping out water from the boat with plastic bags and coconut shells. “That’s why he likes sitting home all day.”
Appu continues washing clothes, his shoulders hung, his eyes on the ground, the same posture his mother holds when she walks past the villagers. He looks up when an object whizzes past his ear, and there is a loud thud. The boys in the boat scream and squeal, and there is the dull clunk of oars as they try to get away. Appu swings around and sees his mother staggering out of the house and now, after having flung the pipe at the boys, she’s collecting stones. But they’re gone already, hooting and howling their protests, yelling bad words sons should never use on their mother. The pipe from their home drifts to the shore in the wake of the fleeing, drowning boat. Appu wades into the stream and retrieves the pipe.
On a good day, Thankam lines her eyes with the black soot from the lamp and wears a red bindhi. On better days, she passes time with Appu in the field across from their little house, gazing up at the tall trees in wonder, one hand to her chin like a cinema actress. Only a rose missing in her hair, Appu tells her sometimes. She’s delighted at his admiration.
Today Appu gives her a rose, a day past its prettiest bloom, the petals curled, leaves browning. But she does not place it in her hair. She holds it. Tiny thorns stub her callused fingers. Her red blouse falls loose on her torso, strung across with safety pins, and the blue-checkered mundu rests high enough that her hips and belly button are wrapped tight. Her raven black hair, always oiled, not a grey strand, is tied into a tight knot. Her fever will not subside. She falls sick often. A few times near fatal. This time too, the fever feels dark and final.
She ties a towel across her torso, wraps another towel over her shoulders before she fastens her grip on Appu’s bare shoulder. He leads her past the fence they have built together. They cross the river in a ferry boat, walk through the village center flanked by a large banyan tree on one side, the temple on the other, and reach the main road where the local clinic stands.
2.
Nurse Raji has put up the last of the new laminated family planning posters, delivered days ago by a messenger. It is slow, dull times. People are wary of coming to the government clinic. Coercion, they accuse. It’s nothing of the sort and she’s of the opinion that one must force some sense into their foolish heads. Fewer children would mean fewer mouths to feed.
Through a window, Nurse Raji sees the boy and his mother arrive. It’s a small village and she knows the boy. He is an unclaimed child, illegitimate, with a mother who has no words. The mute woman has borne five children, the third a stillborn it is rumored, fathered by different men or the same, no one but the woman knows.
Not that it matters, according to Nurse Raji. There’s no benefit in divulging this information. The woman’s problems aren’t fixable; nothing can be undone. The nurse thinks this information, or misinformation, places the woman in a category worse off than herself and she feels little, if any compassion for the woman and her son.
Nurse Raji knows what will be done and she hurries into the Doctor’s office, a simple enclosure partitioned with a false, wooden wall, to prepare Doctor Avarachan for the new patient.
Appu leaves his mother to rest on the bench outside the clinic. A black signboard with white writing informs that Doctor Avarachan is only a General Practitioner, having completed his MBBS; no specialty credentials follows. The clinic is decorated with older dusty posters of studio photographs of beautiful foreign babies and yellowed signs listing vaccination information. Appu notices the new Happy Family posters. A woman holding her child, a happy family of four—a man, a woman, their son, and a baby, a girl, all of them dressed in nice clothes. They stand close together, laughing as if they’ve just heard some wonderful news. Appu decides the family in the picture is beautiful with bright faces and wonderful lives.
He approaches the nurse who busily writes in a thick register. The nurse’s sari and blouse is white tinted blue, as is the stiff white crown placed in her hair on her scalp. Clean, sterile. He removes the family ration card from the pocket of his shorts, the only document they carry along for everything, whether asked or not.
The nurse frowns at him. “What’s wrong with you?” she asks, still writing in the register.
“Not me,” says Appu. “My mother has a fever.”
The nurse returns the ration card without looking at it. “Is that so?” she says. “Bring her in. The doctor will see her.”
“Already?” asks Appu. They are used to waiting.
“Yes. Didn’t you hear me?” says the nurse. She slams the register shut and goes into the doctor’s office.
Doctor Avarachan sits at his desk and overhears the exchange between the Nurse and the boy. Nurse Raji had raced in a few minutes ago to report a patient was approaching the clinic. A new patient during trying times is good news, but Doctor Avarachan’s anxiety only deepens.
Proud of his superior education, Doctor Avarachan is usually abrupt with his patients and speaks to them as if he disapproves of everything they do or do not do. He maintains a pleasant demeanor for the rare clinic visits made by the village’s wealthy few. But unlike most government employees and practitioners, Doctor Avarachan is punctual, always at the clinic on time, though grudgingly.
In recent times, Doctor Avarachan finds himself under duress, his moral sense muddled. It is 1976 and sterilization quotas have been set, the new government directive compels him and other medical practitioners to coax patients to undergo vasectomies and tubal ligations—a consequence of broken governance. He’s not a man of politics. This does not suit his ideals. But, he rationalizes, everything is unusual, a bit backward, upside down and inside out and everyone’s a little crazy, more than a little crazy. Heads are rolling, people are losing their jobs, getting jailed and Doctor Avarachan, who keeps informed of state affairs, unlike most of the villagers (though now even the newspapers are manipulated), has no desire to get caught in the crosshairs of this madness.
His patient, the woman, lies on the high clinic bed, while Doctor Avarachan presses a cold metal stethoscope to her torso and the Nurse sticks a thermometer in her mouth.
“Now, when I say it must be done, she will ask me why she must do it. She might say it is the men who must get it done,” says Doctor Avarachan. He looks at Nurse Raji as if addressing her alone, covering all the reasons by which the patient might decide against sterilization. He speaks in a dull drawl because he’s unmotivated to make such a directive. “But then, think of it from the perspective of better health.”
This is a viable reason, he thinks, pleased that at least he’s advocating not for politics but in line with his profession and pledge. He looks at the woman and points her attention to the Happy Family poster, a repeat copy on the wall inside the enclosure.
“You’ve had four children, how many more? You’re so weak,” says Doctor Avarachan. His face contorts into what he thinks is sorrow and pity, but he merely looks like one might at a fly on fresh food. He does not realize that he’s kinder than he would have been during a normal consultation.
Nurse Raji smiles and Doctor Avarachan instinctively frowns at her. They do not share the same frequency. When he speaks, he enunciates the words slowly, his eyebrows raised, hoping the Nurse understands that her opinion is not welcome. That she is merely playing a role in making this exchange more compassionate and bearable, if that is possible at all.
Nurse Raji thinks Doctor Avarachan could be more stringent and urgent. The way he says it, the whole thing sounds optional and how is that going to get them anywhere? Besides, aren’t they all affected? No one’s spared. Salaries are being withheld, people are losing their jobs, she’s heard from nurse friends working in nearby villages. She worries Doctor Avarachan will let this opportunity slip away.
“Besides, what else can be done? We can’t convince all the men in the village to live the remainder of their lives castrated so that she will no longer bear children,” says Nurse Raji.
Doctor Avarachan glares at her. “Think before you go about spewing stupid ideas! You’re a nurse. Do you not know the difference between a vasectomy and castration?”
Nurse Raji gets busy with a platter of instruments they do not need. And he sees she does not understand at all. She lacks sensitivity and passion for her work, she lacks a good education having completed her nursing course at a third-tier college and he despises her lack of standards.
Then the Doctor turns to the woman understanding it is better to be direct, he will receive no support from Nurse Raji, and he explains that it is a simple procedure of snipping and tying, clamping something, a couple of stitches. He tells her she will be able to walk right out of the Sterilization Camp as soon as she’s had a bit of rest. It is such a minor procedure she won’t even know she’s had it.
“You must think about it,” he says. “They will also give you some money and ration. There is a camp in town beginning Wednesday. I cannot treat you until you have attended the camp. This is a new directive. For the time being, I will give you some medicine. The other clinics won’t even give you this.” He writes out a note about the Sterilization Camp—date, location, and timing on a piece of paper and along with some tablets hands it to the woman’s son who is escorted in by the Nurse.
“Three times a day, one tablet. This should help.”
He notices the fear in the woman’s eyes.
“This is not something I agree with. But we must abide. Everyone must abide. There is no other way,” he says. “You might even be denied ration. Do you want your children to starve? Let’s pray that things will soon go back to normal. But now you must attend the camp.” It is final. His eyes drift to the pictures of beautiful infants on the walls of his clinic. The Nurse follows the Doctor’s gaze to the pictures on the walls.
“After that, we will do some tests to find out the reason for this fever. It could be pneumonia, it could be something worse,” he warns and returns to his desk.
Thankam and Appu return home, her hand on the boy’s shoulder. She’s barefoot but does not feel stones pressing into the soles of her feet. She does not notice that her mundu has become wet in the river. She cannot imagine the procedure the doctor has explained. It makes her dizzy. She does not want anything sliced and tied in her body.
Appu watches her as she tries to show no emotion on her face. She’s unable to overcome her worry for her children: What might happen to them if she does not survive the slicing and knotting and stitching of her body parts?
Appu continues to watch. Thankam pulls out the little black purse from inside her blouse, finds a single coin at the bottom.
Sometimes, when they need things like firewood or coconut husk to light their stove, Thankam scavenges the grounds of the bigger village houses, some with so many occupants they keep little track of their belongings and throw away things with much use left—tarnished chocolate tin boxes, clothes, and this little black purse with the gold buckle.
She gives the coin to Appu, indicates it is for him to buy something for himself and watches him walk toward the tea stall nearby.
3.
Thankam’s Christian faith resulted from human intervention. After Appu was born, Annamma, the wife of the wealthiest landowner in the village, took it upon herself to build Thankam a house in the cove that floods every monsoon. In return, Thankam works for Annamma. She cooks and cleans, grinds grain, washes clothes, starches saris, and runs errands. Within a year of her employment, Annamma led Thankam to the only Catholic Church in the village where she and her children were baptized.
Annamma has two children of her own—a girl and a boy. After the birth of her second child and after consulting with her husband, a forward-thinking man who loves his wife for her company and conversation, Annamma got her tubes tied at the Medical College. This had been riveting news to the villagers, especially to the other women who had babies until they wore out their bodies, as well as their resources. And it had been perplexing news to the barren women who could not have children, unable to keep their babies inside, one even losing babies when she squatted on the toilet.
Annamma had suffered no such tragedies.
“What do you plan to do?” Annamma asks Thankam. Appu has delivered the doctor’s note to Annamma, as they deliver all of their problems.
Thankam extends her hands.
Annamma is protected. The only offspring of wealthy landowners, she has inherited connections, money and the family name.
“This cannot be forced. And why are they after you? Did you not tell them that you’ve no intention to let anyone near you, that you live on my land now and if they are really worried they should do something effective, like castrating all of those animals who caused you trouble?” says Annamma. She’s angry and gestures with her arm, like a politician making a speech. In her other hand, she holds a magazine with which she fans herself every now and then.
Annamma’s face softens. She’s silent for a moment.
“Thankam, you must do what benefits you the most.” Annamma rubs her fingers to imply cash. “This won’t end well for anyone. Everyone’s gone mad and they will be after you until you do this.”
Annamma’s eyebrows rise and her mouth stretches into a slim line, strained, as if she too is an anyone, as subdued as everyone else.
“Thankam, don’t worry about the doctor. If your fever gets worse, I’ll take you to the private hospital in town. They can’t deny you treatment. Now, bring me a bowl from the kitchen. I’ll give you some rice. It’ll help until you’re well again,” says Annamma.
It’s an offering, something to relieve the ache of this new trouble. Thankam is grateful, but the rice will run out soon. As will the medicine.
Thankam goes to the kitchen and brings the aluminum bowl and waits while Annamma fills it with rice.
4.
On Sunday, following the nine o’clock mass, Appu attends catechism class where the unpredictable Sister Grace, who sometimes seems angelic and at other times less so, lectures the students about God’s plan and God’s wrath.
The children are released at one o’clock when the sun is hot and high in the sky, and their stomachs rumble like wild jungle animals. The clang of the metal school bell rings in Appu’s ears as he hurries along the parapet of the church offices, his catechism textbook rolled and held by the waistband of his only good shorts.
Appu is almost at the end of the parapet when he catches sight of Father Pious, standing by a bright blue church pillar, his arms behind him. Appu is at once certain that the priest holds a cane in his hidden hands.
“Come here boy!” bellows the priest.
Father Pious, the parish priest of the only church in the village, has no malleable attribute in his nature. The children fear him—they call him Father, and he uses the cane liberally as if he’s in charge of a prison full of miscreants. And since his parishioners are poor, the weekly offertory collection meager, his sermons find fault with privilege—rich people and their surpluses, luxury items like cars, and those private English medium schools that he has decided are corrupted, moneymaking machines. He despises the only television in the village that’s mostly tuned into hazy, disrupted telecasts of sports match replays and Sunday matinee movies, all of which mislead people with ideas of money, glory, and vanity. Father Pious was born into a family in penury, the third son, promised to the church at birth. He’s thankful to his parents for what they have done for him. The rest of his siblings, all married and parents, struggle with the entrapments of life.
There’s not a second for Appu to turn around and run away in a different direction. He walks to the priest, hands by his sides grabbing his thighs, worried about his exposed legs.
“Boy, I hear that your mother is busy making favor with village royalty, Annamma and her group that claims to be progressive and all of that rubbish. There was a time when those people held all the power and money and land. It’s all over now. Times have changed and if your mother chooses to listen to propaganda that works against the teachings of the Holy Book, she will have to repent. Here, and later on when we die, we must answer to God,” says Father Pious. He speaks in a strange strained, nasal voice Appu associates with the cane.
“Tell your mother that if she doesn’t attend mass and if she continues to associate with deviants, she and you and all of your rowdy brothers will find yourselves excommunicated. Such things are not said for good Catholics. Do you know what it means to be a child of God? To be summoned as one of his children in your lifetime?”
The priest glowers.
Not even a slip of a thought occurs to Appu and he does not speak back to the parish priest. Instead, when he is released, Appu goes straight to Annamma, well aware of her dislike toward the priest.
Thankam and Appu stand in the yard. Annamma sits in the verandah of her home with her visiting friend. They discuss Father Pious. Thankam and Appu listen.
“He looks like a dried up old twig, but he thinks he’s the Pope,” says Annamma.
There are rumors Annamma is waiting for the right time to work her influence and pass Father Pious onto another congregation.
“If it weren’t for my family, Father Pious would have a paddy field for a parish. Now he sits in the church that my great grandfather built, on the land that my family gave them for nothing, and not a day goes by that he doesn’t remind the congregation of his stupidity,” she says.
“What has happened to him? Father Pious usually stays out of such matters,” says the friend, who has a more gracious opinion of the priest.
“Hemorrhoids,” mumbles Annamma, sour-faced.
“Really?” asks the friend, wide-eyed.
“Could be,” says Annamma with a haughty, lazy shrug of her shoulders. “How does he even find out about these things? Is it said for priests to be village gossips?”
“It’s a small village, and everyone has a big mouth,” says the friend.
Annamma stands up and steps out of the verandah, angry and determined.
“Thankam, you won’t do anything yet. Now, this is my problem as much as it is yours,” she says. Appu looks at his mother, his face still cherubic and lovely.
Thankam feels no joy or relief at Annamma’s involvement. This is turning into a big, loud issue. She would have quietly agreed to the sterilization had she known it would become a village feud. She’s angry with Appu for having brought this to Annamma’s attention. It is unnecessary. But he’s an intelligent boy, Thankam knows. A good student and shrewd with his chores.
Later, she reprimands her son by tugging on a curl of his hair and pinching his skin. She does not do this hard enough to hurt him, but she wants him to understand she’s angry and even hurt that he thought her so weak that he went to Annamma without consulting her first. He’s still young and should think of her as his whole world. When did that change? She feels a sudden weight pull on her heart.
Thankam’s fever has tempered slightly. She sweeps the yard of Annamma’s house when Father Pious arrives. He’s accompanied by another man everyone knows as Church Committee Mathew. The men walk into the yard at a brisk pace and when Father Pious sees Thankam he slows down and turns his face away. She does not see him; she carries on sweeping the yard, her back to the men. The men enter the verandah of the house. Annamma is already there, sitting in a chair under the fan.
“Come in, come in,” she says to the priest and his companion. “Please sit down.” And as per the practice, she offers them coffee or tea.
The men take their seats and Annamma sits across from them.
“Is George home?” Father Pious asks for Annamma’s husband.
“He’s in town today. He’ll be home late tonight. What’s the matter, Father?” she asks.
Father Pious is reluctant to discuss the reason for his visit with Annamma. But after a moment, he speaks.
“You’re aware, I’m certain, that we have inaugurated a fund to rebuild the west wing of the church. A bit of what we collect will go to building improvements as well. The church is old,” says the priest.
They are here for a contribution. A substantial one, for they do not mention an amount. Numbers will be discussed only with Annamma’s husband.
“All good intentions,” says Annamma. Her husband handles these matters.
Tea and snacks are delivered on a tray. The men sip on their tea and they are silent. Annamma stands up and steps out of the verandah.
“Thankam! Thankam, come here,” she calls.
Thankam stops sweeping the yard and drops the broom to a side. She goes to Annamma and only then sees the priest and Church Committee Mathew in their chairs, holding their cups of tea.
“Father, do you remember Thankam?” Annamma asks.
The priest’s face wilts. He sets down his tea on the teapoy and crosses his arms and clears his throat, and re-crosses his arms and clears his throat again.
Annamma returns to her seat, across from the men. Thankam remains outside the verandah, in the yard.
“Father, must I remind you that when we call you Father you are the church Father and not the Father of her children and mine or the rest of your parishioners?” says Annamma. Church Committee Mathew looks like he has received an electric shock, the severe tone of Annamma’s words sufficient to create such an effect. He looks from Annamma to the priest, and back.
“You mustn’t interfere in this matter, Annamma,” says Father Pious.
“Impossible!” says Annamma and slaps the teapoy. The priest jumps in his chair and a moment goes by before he speaks.
“What’s your contention in this matter, Annamma?” he asks.
“She did not ask to be sterilized. The clinic denied her treatment and there’s word that even rations will be withheld. She’s helpless. As a priest is it not your duty to make sure your wards are not harassed?”
“I do not wish to get involved in such things,” says Father Pious.
“But you have involved yourself by making plans to bar them from the church,” says Annamma.
“The church wants no part in this, neither does it need such a ward,” says Father Pious.
“Because she makes no substantial contribution to your church fund as my husband will?” asks Annamma, but now Father Pious will not look at her.
“If we speak of sin, you must first bar me and my kin. I made the choice to have no more children a long time ago. That must make me an undesirable ward. And when you make that decision, remember to return everything that’s of sin. Every yard of land, every brick, every sack of cement, every paisa of donation my family has made to your church.”
Father Pious says nothing more. He abandons his tea and prepares to leave.
“I will inform my husband of your visit,” says Annamma. She remains seated.
5.
At school, on Tuesday, Appu is asked to leave his classroom.
He waits outside the Principal’s office, holding his slate and chalk, one among a group of children from many classrooms. The children wait, very quiet, and listen as Appu’s class teacher, Mosha, tells the Principal and assembled faculty that the children must be kept out of school until their families adhere to the Sterilization Directive.
The Principal is not convinced. He looks at the children Mosha has collected and understands Mosha for the kind of man he is, someone who thinks the poor are vulnerable and better accustomed to accept harsh realities, it is reasonable they make the bigger sacrifices.
“The government has taken upon this difficult task of righting a nation in crisis. It must be done. This is a necessary part of national reconstruction. Overpopulation is a concern. And you know the rule. One adult per family must undergo the procedure!” says Mosha. He pounds the table, hard and heavy with a fair hand attached to a fair wrist to a fair arm. Even the hair on his arms and his balding scalp is light-toned.
The Principal shakes his head.
Mosha has money. He has an esteemed family lineage. He has power. He has local political ties. He has influence over the other teachers, even the peons. They trust Mosha in a way they have never trusted the Principal.
The Principal cannot understand this, nor can he wrap his mind around a compelled sterilization. What does a child’s education have to do with this? Why must the school be involved? They are all so misguided.
Then, just for the sake of argument, the Principal wonders if Mosha and his group are correct and if he is the misguided one. The Principal is aware he is no risk taker. He has always played it safe—even with the family money, he worked to keep the money and land in the family. His choice of wife, a distant relative, familiar and expected. Maybe Mosha is right. Such an extreme step might benefit the Nation.
“Principal, what is there to analyze? I’m a decent, fair man. I ask for nothing more than what is right, what a country expects from every citizen. It is fair and even.”
Mosha is fair, only in the complexion of his skin, thinks the Principal for one quiet, brave moment. He knows an unjust man when he sees one. A good person, a good teacher would never hold their students hostage to politics.
It is well known Mosha is at odds with his father, a public dispute within a powerful family. This might be debilitating for Mosha, the Principal understands and he feels sorry for the young man. But only for a second.
Mosha holds his gaze, steady, even when the Principal looks around, at the broken, eroded floor, bare soiled walls. He feels Mosha’s eyes on him, they pierce hot holes through his skull; perspiration collects on his forehead.
It is a tumultuous time. No one can be trusted. If he does not support his teachers, then he might find himself alone and isolated when he needs their help. The Principal cannot run a school by himself. Besides, these people aren’t goons or thugs who chant what they’ve been fed for a fee. They are educated men and women. They are teachers.
An early retirement is a mere misstep away. An unpopular decision will prompt the administrators to twist his arm to sign away his chair. The Principal touches the chair’s solid teak arms, the desk that is the largest in the school inside the only office with windows that have intact shutters.
“It must be done?” he asks.
“Principal, a mother might force-feed her child, must scold or discipline her child who is too young to know what is good for her. Our country is young. Not thirty years since Independence. A bit of compulsion, a bit of enforcing, and only for its betterment,” says Mosha. He leans over the table, closer to the Principal so the other teachers will not hear. “Besides, you do know that Motivators are rewarded,” he says.
At this moment, the Principal knows he despises Mosha. Sterilization Motivators, the middlemen, a repugnant title. Those who make directives from the Nation’s capital can view citizens as mere statistics. They do not have to do the dirty work.
“It must be done!” Mosha insists.
“It must be done,” the Principal repeats.
“Let’s be done with it, yes,” says Mosha. He stands up straight, his shoulders unfolded and square.
This time it is Thankam who goes to Annamma’s house, Appu in tow. She shoves Appu forward, a little too hard and he looks at her with hurt eyes. She doesn’t care. She gestures for him to tell Annamma what has happened. They stand in that same yard, outside the same verandah. This time Thankam cries and beats her chest. This time it’s unbearable. That her son, the good one, might be deprived of an education. It makes no sense. Why does the school care about this?
She’s ready to give up and set off to town for the Sterilization Camp, any Sterilization Camp. She would have waited at the local bus stand until the camp, any camp opened. But Annamma has ordered her to do nothing. And she fears upsetting her employment, the arrangement that allows her and her son to live in the cove.
Annamma listens to the boy and observes his mother’s distress. She frowns, angry at how much Thankam and her son have been troubled.
“Stop crying, Thankam! Be here at noon tomorrow. Bring the boy along and we’ll go see the Principal together. We’ll put an end to this. There won’t be any more trouble,” says Annamma. Appu nods, glad, and Thankam sees how certain he is about Annamma’s promise. She has stopped crying, but unlike Appu, she’s too afraid to believe the problem can be solved. Everyone is playing a different game.
6.
It is a sunny morning and the fever has lifted. Thankam has decided to trust. Annamma will take care of them, and the issue at Appu’s school will be solved today.
Thankam bathes and wears her best blouse, studies her face in a small mirror, places a red bindhi on her forehead, and lines her eyes with kajal. She sits with Appu in the field across from their house. They gaze at the tallest trees in wonder. She sits with a hand to her chin like a cinema actress. And she waits for Appu to tell her all that is missing is a rose in her hair. She knows he will study and become more than anybody they know has ever become. He’s good with his writing, memorizing his lessons and practicing it on his slate and reading aloud at home every evening. He will do well, she’s certain of this.
When Appu stands up and looks intently towards the stream and their home, Thankam hears it too. Footsteps approach. She remains seated, still looking at the trees. It’s an open field that does not belong to Annamma, unfenced and overgrown with tall weeds, with a walking path beaten down by passing feet.
The footsteps stop. Thankam looks over her shoulder. There is a man standing behind them.
The man is married, she knows. He has children, a whole brood of sons and daughters. He would want no more, certainly not her Appu, who will remain illegitimate. The man would permit no such claim.
For only a second, the man looks into her eyes. His gaze trails to Appu. Thankam feels something cold run through her body, and every nerve, even her fingernails tingle. Then the man looks at the ground and he trudges past them and down the path. She wonders if the man has recognized his son.
He was a puzzle to Thankam. She could spot a letch, a creep from a kilometer away. This man was unexpected. She would have never thought this man would be at her door, in her house. But he had appeared, just like the others, no different. He must see her the same way as the villagers, and Doctor Avarachan, and Nurse Raji, and Father Pious, Annamma, everyone else. Weak and helpless, at their mercy.
After the man leaves, Appu tells her all that is missing is a rose in her hair.
“A red one,” says Appu. “Red roses are the most beautiful.”
The man has made no impression on the boy. Thankam smiles. In her son’s eyes, she’s a cinema actress.
7.
The Sterilization Camp opens at eight o’clock in the morning. By noon the day has become hot and humid, the breeze suffocating. Large tents occupy an open ground. Buses of candidates arrive on the hour. They are led in long lines for procedures that will last about a minute, or so it seems. When Thankam is finished, she rests in the tent for women. She lies on a sheet on the floor; the tent is packed and busy with moans and rocking bodies. She waits for further instructions. There’s another tent for men.
Appu will go to Annamma’s home alone. He will wait in the yard outside the verandah by himself. Annamma will hear of this, and Thankam worries she will lose favor with her employer. She must explain, it had to be done. It would have been foolish to carry on with things as they were.
She holds her ration card and a piece of paper a nurse has given her. The full bag of ration and the bucket is a gift. She has been given some money, rolled and tucked away in her mundu. And now, while the Emergency and its calamitous entrails stretch on for many months, there will be no more grief in Thankam’s pond.
