I found her old right from the time I could recognise men and matters. She was lean, fairly tall, dark brown in complexion with grey hair cropped in the fashion of men. She always wore white saris over a white chemise and went barefoot.

She was one of our family who stayed with us and did household chores. She was, however, not the usual housemaid. It is not easy to list her jobs  which ranged from grinding spices, grating coconuts,churning milk, extracting fruit juices, making dough, rolling chapaties to breaking coals into small pieces for the chulas, chopping firewood and tending to the cattle. She had also to take the children – some eight of us – on their daily outings and also to fairs and puppet shows that were organised on special occasions.

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She was a widow of 12 when she was brought to our house from the place where we had our farm lands. She was born to poor parents of the barber caste and my bardadu (grandfather’s elder brother) took charge of her food and shelter to save her from an uncertain fate. Her name was Shanti. My father and uncles as well as our paternal aunts were still children when she came so that she called them by their names. The daughters-in-law of the family addressed her as Shanti Di while children called her by the name bardadu had coined for her – Shanti Ma!

Shanti Ma would get up before dawn, use the toilet at the back of the house, change her clothes and be ready for the day’s work which would continue till night. She would lie on the floor in one corner of the corridor on a mat over which would be rolled out a thin bed that would be rolled back and removed in the morning. Although non-vegetarian food was not prohibited to her as a widow of a lower caste she rarely ever had any. Shanti Ma was never heard to complain of her workload. She would, on the contrary, intervene to save or retrieve any work done carelessly by any of the housewives. She would later joke on those with them whom she claimed to have brought to our house as brides.

Of the children she had to herd out and in every afternoon, I gave her the most trouble. Once on the main thoroughfare, I would often break loose from her grip and run after vehicles or street dogs. Sometimes, I would lie in the middle of the road just when a vehicle was coming that way. It was great fun as she would shriek and appeal to passersby to catch me and bring me back to her.

She would threaten everyday to tell mother of my wickedness but would not mention it once we were back lest I got a beating – a prospect unacceptable to her. Life was not comfortable for Shanti Ma but it had passed more or less evenly since her widowhood. Bardadu and my own dadu took care that she got a safe and assured life in our household. Things, however, started to change after they died. Our single family broke into three and separate kitchens appeared one day. Although the broken families stayed in the same house and the properties and assets awaited division, Shanti Ma emerged as a problem. To whom would she be apportioned? Who would take care of her? The three families decided that she would have her meals by turn at each kitchen while her other requirements would be jointly met. In return, she would make her services available to all the three families. The arrangement started to falter in no time causing great mental agony to her. She was soon accused of partiality to one over another and a subtle apathy in behaviour was noticed by her in some kitchens. She wept silently over it. When my mother asked her to take all her meals at ours she could, however, not decide. Her loyalty to all three brothers made it difficult for her to sever her bond with any. On many days, therefore, she skipped her meals on the pretext of not being well.

The situation became complicated when she fell ill and required attention instead of giving it as she had thus far. Who would attend to her? Who would assist her if she became incapable of going to the toilet? There were no ayahs available in the countryside, nor any old-age home where she could be put. We were too young to guess what was up but soon learnt that Shanti Ma would be sent to her paternal home!

We learnt that the three family-heads had contacted one of her nephews and persuaded him to take her in return for a monthly payment for as long as she remained alive. When Shanti Ma was told of this arrangement, she cried inconsolably and stated that her nephew would not take care of her but would pocket the money. Despite her illness, she moved from one room to another with her appeal.

“Kalidas,” she told my father, “don’t drive me away, Kalidas! I will not cause any inconvenience to you. I will die soon and not be a burden for long.” She made the same appeal to my mother.

She received assurances from all three families that she would be brought back as soon as she recovered. But she knew these were hollow promises. On the appointed day, her nephew came and her belongings were put into a bag. Slowly, her back bent, she proceeded to the exit after offering her last pranam to portraits of our dead grandfathers. I was standing at the door when she lost control and burst into tears. “Khokababa!

You couldn’t keep your Shanti Ma with you!” I received her last hug, not knowing what to tell her. She was then lifted on to the rickshaw. As the rickshaw started to move, she took one last look at the house she had lived in for over seventy years. I never knew what happened to her, nor when she died. The migration of our family to Kolkata a few years later cemented the break. Shanti Ma gradually receded into the back of our memory and finally faded away. Only on some nights, when most men and animals are silent and asleep, I seem to hear a plaintive voice calling me from a distance – “Khokababa! You couldn’t keep your Shanti Ma with you!”