Fiction: When Mummy Made Karhi Chawal

Once upon a time, before Clement Atlee announced the independence of India in the House of Commons, a girl was born to a school teacher who had earlier left his service in the British army after his appeal for an emergency leave to rush to his ailing older daughter was refused. It is not known that how the family reacted to the birth of this third daughter in a row. Vimla was the eldest. The one that followed her died before a name could have been thought for her.

This last born was named Pushpa. She was not a good student but excelled in athletics and regularly represented her college in the district-level javelin throw events. When she turned eighteen, a farmer's handsome son with an engineering degree from the Birla Institute of Technology in Pilani, made her his bride, after his fiancée whom he had originally intended to marry died of influenza.

Not long after the beginning of her new life, Pushpa gave birth to a girl followed by another girl followed by a boy. The younger daughter resembled her in looks while the other two children went after the father.

•

Years passed. Pushpa became a matronly woman. She gained weight. Her arms accumulated flesh. Her hair went grey. The pressure of the blood in her circulatory system increased. Her head aches occurred more often. But the family flourished and even though Pushpa had four PWD servants under her command, she remained the mistress of the kitchen.

One summer evening while she was thinking of her late mother who had died before realizing her dream to see the birth of her grandson, Pushpa decided to cook Karhi Chawal for dinner. The preparation that is involved in the making of Karhi Chawal always reminded Pushpa of her mother.

With a sigh of loss for the lost days of childhood and affected by a pang of longing for her dead Ammaji, Pushpa added besan into the day-old dahi in a medium-sized bhagona and started whisking the mixture. Then she took a large deep-bottomed brass karahi, poured some ghee and put it on the gas burner. After the methi seeds started crackling, she fried onions and later added the besan mixture. As it came to a boil, Pushpa lowered the gas flame and let the kachhi Karhi to simmer. The entire house was suffused with the khatti smell of the bubbling curry.

•

"Neelu, you want garam pakoris?" she shouted out to Mukul.

"Na Mummy. But please do not make pakori-wali-Karhi. I want aloos." Mukul was doing his Maths home-work on the dining table from where he occasionally glanced at his mother in the kitchen.

"Last time we had what you wanted. But we can't always have aloo-aloo." The usual jingle of Pushpa's payal and the clinker of her chooris, accompanied by the smell of besan ki pakodis, preceded her arrival in the dining room. The dry salty smell of the freshly-made pakoris made Mukul a little misty-headed. He did like these deep-fried dumplings but not in Karhi where they become so soft and mushy.

"You always say that. But I am warning you beforehand that I will not have chappatis with karhi. Only Chawal!" Mukul affirmed.

"Of course you will have to have rotis too." Asserting these words, Pushpa hurried back to the kitchen. The Karhi had boiled to the brim. Quickly turning the gas knob, she skimmed the foam formed on the surface with a wooden spatula.

•

As the Karhi simmered on, the khatti scent mixed with the bitter-tangy aroma of methi seeds grew more intense. Consequently the whole house was thrown into turmoil. It disoriented everyone.

Kailash, the servant, was transfixed. Mukul was distracted and left puzzled by a relatively uncomplicated profit and loss problem in his exercise book. Paro, the older daughter doing her BA (English Literature, Economics, Modern History) from Allahabad University, put down Sidney Sheldon's The Other Side of Midnight more than five times and that was quite unusual.

Paridhi, younger than Paro by two-and-a-half years and the most studious in the family, who was preparing for the CPMT medical entrance examination, twice left the 'office room' to flutter around her mother, ostensibly to get a cold water bottle from the fridge. Pushpa herself was lost in the past, re-living those terrible days when Ammaji was not able to get up from bed due to her spondylitis problem.

•

Evening dissolved into dusk and the sky outside had turned to black. There was a half moon shining somewhere outside but nobody cared. All were seated in the dining room. Most of the eyes were most of the times coming to rest on the white-colored casserole at the center of the table that had a figure of a swinging mermaid painted on one side of it. The casserole was closed with a white-colored lid to prevent the flavor from escaping its treasure chest.

Pushpa arrived; again the jingling of the payal and the clinking of the chooris preceded her. She sat down on her chair, looked around, focused eyes on the engineer husband sitting on her left and frowned.

"How many times have I said that no one will read newspapers while eating? Why does nobody listen to me? Why can't people do one thing at a time?" She complained.

Her husband catching the hint angrily flung the Delhi edition of The Times of India (that was delivered in Allahabad only by late evening) away to an empty corner of the dining table and made a face as exasperated as Pushpa's.

An unquiet silence resulted from this domestic disharmony. A sensation of discomfort lingered for a few moments upon the table and around the diners. It descended only after Pushpa opened the casserole.

Her part ended there. The rest of the magic was left to the Karhi to execute. The steam hissed out. The sour perfume rose to the ceiling. The flavor continuously jiggled around in a Brownian movement all over the table till everyone managed to regain sanity by finally acclimatizing their senses to its texture. The entire dining room was uplifted by the aroma of the yellow curry. Gradually passions that were allowed to be released so imprudently settled back with a blush. Emotions were calmed. Excitement was tamed. Anxiousness was suspended. But the craving did not subside.

It had to be satisfied.

•

The mirchi ka tadka had left behind a trail of blood-red stains on the yellow surface of the Karhi. The pakoris stood out like rock-sized pearls in an ocean. Everyone handed their katoris to Pushpa by turns (first her husband, then son and then the daughters), who in turn filled each bowl with four ladle-full of Karhi along with two pakoris for everyone.

"'Mummy, please. I don't want pakoris." Mukul pleaded as he was being served.

Pushpa raised her eyes, lowered the ladle once again into the casserole and contemptuously added a third pakori. Mukul twitched his lips. His eyes glowed with anger. The ends of his ears flushed red. His closed mouth buzzed with unsaid rage. Bitterness simmered inside him.

Pushpa sensed the young boy's tension. She did not insist on chappatis and served him straight with the fragrant basmati rice.

•

"Oh Mummy, Karhi is excellent," Paridhi moaned wistfully. She closed her eyes before helping herself to another spoon; this time licking the Karhi alone. Alone! Without letting its taste corrupted by the starchiness of the rice or by the crspinness of the chappatis.

"Neelu, do you know what we used to call Karhi in the hostel?" asked Paro. She had done her schooling from St. Mary's Convent in Nainital where she was a hosteler.

"How can you translate Karhi into English?" Mukul wondered aloud. He knew that there was a 5-rupee school fine for speaking Hindi in St Mary's Convent but could not think of any English name for Karhi.

"You don't know the English name for Karhi, foolish boy!" Paro teased in mocked astonishment.

Paridhi conspiratorially looked at her sister and tried to swallow her laughter along with the rice.

Meanwhile Pushpa called to Kaliash for more rice while the frowning engineer husband had somehow managed to get The Times of India under his plate without anybody noticing it.

"Mummy, see didi is calling me foolish boy! Now you can yourself see who starts the fighting but you do not say anything to her." Mukul protested.

"First of all you should learn not to speak while eating." Pushpa said as her fingers effortlessly rolled karhi-drained rice into small balls which she was swiftly tossing into her mouth. Ammaji also used to eat rice by first making them into balls.

Paro wriggled her tongue out at Mukul.

"But didi, what is Karhi called in English?" Paridhi asked innocently. She had mischief laughing inside her eyes. Pushpa could always make out that eye-secreted mischief in her younger daughter but she was too absorbed in her Karhi, too involved in her mother's memory to be distracted.

An interval of shaky silence trudged along only to be intruded by the clanking noise of a spoon against a plate or the crashing sound of the drinking water being poured into the aluminum glasses.

•

Paro was the first to finish her dinner. After her plate was cleared away by Kailash, she lounged back in her chair to observe Mukul for a while. Quickly throwing a secret knowing glance at Paridhi, she addressed her brother in a serious tone: "Listen foolish boy. Listen. It is a shame that you do not know even basic elemental English. I will now tell you what Karhi is called by the people of England."

Mukul looked up. Pushpa did not say anything. Her husband continued with the food and the newspaper.

Paro said, "People of England call it Shit Curry."

Both the sisters burst out laughing.

"Karhi is yellow. Shit is yellow. Karhi is a curry. So it is a Shit Curry. By the way do you know Prince Charles likes Shit Curry but Princess Diana hates it."

The husband did not stray away from The Times of India. Pushpa made a face. Mukul turned his head down in disgust.

•

The dinner ended. Everyone was content.

•

Just before they were going to sleep, Paro came to Mukul's room and said in a sing-song tone, "Goodnight foolish boy."

Mukul squirmed and shot back, "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Yes. Please do." Paro laughed.

The boy slept a fitful sleep in which he had a dream in which Paro was eating Karhi Chawal. He could see her saying something but was not able to hear. It was like as if the television was left on mute. After studying her lip movements for a while, Mukul imagined her uttering Shit Curry.

ShitCurryShitCurryShitCurryShitCurryShitCurryShitCurry ..

The dream haunted him throughout the night.

•

"Mummy what is in my tiffin box?" Mukul asked Pushpa the next morning while leaving for school.

"Parathas with aam ka achar. You'll have Karhi for lunch, after you return from school."

"But Mummy..."

"Hai Bhagwan, I haven't made Karhi for myself. It is only for you people." Pushpa cried before busying herself in dusting the furniture.

•

"Neelu. Neeelu. Neeeeelu!" Pushpa exclaimed while chatting with Mrs Bansal in the drawing room.

"I'm coming, coming. At least let me have water first. It is so hot outside." Mukul answered.

"Beta, your clothes are lying on the stool and throw your school uniform in the washing machine. The Karhi is in the frypan in the kitchen. Kailash has just heated it. The Chawal is in the donga on the dining table.'

"Ok but first I will first take a shower."

"Paridhi is done with her lunch. But make sure to leave half of the remaining Karhi for Paro." Pushpa gave final instructions before picking up the thread of her conversation with Mrs Bansal. "And listen beta, do not have the whole thing alone. Leave the half for Paro. Nothing was cooked today.'"
There was a powercut so both Pushpa and Mrs Bansal were fanning themselves with plastic fans.

•

His share of Karhi Chawal soon got over. His appetite too was taken care of. But Mukul was greedy for more.

There was still some of it lying in the kitchen. Lying tantalizingly! Lying for Paro who would return from the university anytime now.

The opportunity was on offer. Kailash had retired for an afternoon nap to his quarters. Pushpa was engrossed with Mrs Bansal. Paridhi was studying in the 'office room'. Mukul gently tiptoed into the kitchen, emptied the frypan of all its Karhi and noiselessly ladled out the rice. He then hushed back to the dining table and quickly finished the entire meal.

•

Calling Kailash to park her TVS Suzuki moped in the garage, Paro entered the kitchen and shouted to Pushpa, "Mummy, where's my Karhi Chawal."

"It is there in the frypan. Finish it all. Everyone ate theirs. It is all for you."

"But there is nothing in it, Mummy!" Parul said.

The jingles and clinkers preceded Pushpa as she stepped in the kitchen.

"There is nothing left?" She sounded surprised.

Paro did not answer.

"There is nothing left." Pushpa discovered. "Neelu. Neeelu."

"Yes I finished it all." Mukul defiantly shouted from his room. "I ate all the Shit Curry. Tell this to that foolish girl."

'Oh Mummy.' Paro looked pained.

Pushpa held her.

"He is so selfish." Paro's eyes were moist. She started crying.

Mukul heard her sobbing. With a guilty feeling, he fell on his bed where he hid his face under the pillow.

•

Seventeen years have passed since that afternoon and Pushpa's son still remembers the taste of that Karhi which her daughter could not have the next day. Just as Pushpa still nurtures the memories of those long nights that were spent by Ammaji in making her legendary Karhi.