"Papiha"

I grew up in a locality which was at the heart of the city and in an era when cooperative societies were a new thing in Pune, people were fascinated for moving into flats from "Wada". It was not only economical but a social & cultural change for people in Pune. Societies back then were not like today's residential complexes with proper defined lay-outs with demarcated areas for Residential & commercial activities. Most of the buildings had commercial establishments like shops, restaurants, garage etc.  Our Brahmadarshan was one such building located at the heart of the city, very close to a railway station. It was a cooperative society (at least for records) but still it had traces of Pune's famous "Wada Culture". We had "open door" policy amongst neighbors and sharing  food items &  gossips on a daily basis was a routine. People didn't need any invitation to walk into each others houses and things like getting a new gas connection were celebrated by all. Our Brahmadarshan had three wings and one could clearly make out three different economic and social strata represented by these wings.

Our wing had all one bed room hall kitchen flats and me and other children in this wing used to go to Marathi medium schools, our parents were government employees and we didn't have a telephone connection or a vehicle for that matter. One wing out of remaining two had two bed rooms, hall kitchen flats, kids in those flats were in English Medium/Convent schools and most of the mothers in those houses were house wives and the "Men" of the house indulged in business activities. The kids in this wing never played with us or interacted with us as the Economical divide was too disticntly visible even at such small age. 

The last wing was a different equation altogether coz it had flats of people from other cities in India especially Mumbai & were kept locked most of the times. The owners came once in a month or so. Elders in their discussions used to say "because of these people" our flats coasted us more and we kids who heard this used to hate these people :). 

Growing up in this locality with so many people around was special & I enjoyed every bit of it. 

As mentioned earlier we had commercial establishments in and around our building one of such establishments was a kitchen unit of a sweet shop in our locality. This shop was owned by one Marwadi man and all the people in our locality referred to him as "marwadi" and all the employees working there were from some village in Rajasthan & used to speak in a language which we never understood. They also used to play music continuously in order to entertain themselves, this was a point of conflict between our society and "Marwadi". None of the workers in the kitchen survived and used flee away in less than six months time from the kitchen and were replaced by new workers. 

During my 6th std summer vacation one such worker was brought in to the kitchen. This was a kid of 11-12 years, short in height he was very slim and always used to wear black chaddi & baniyan. He being the youngest in the lot got a lot of stick from other workers in the kitchen. They used to beat him up for small small things and he had a peculiar way of crying loudly. Me and my friends were very curious about this little fellow as he was working in an age when we were going to school and forget about we cooking our own food we didn't even know names of items in our kitchens. 

One day while playing cricket our ball went towards this kitchen site and one of my friend went there to get the ball  and the incident transpired as below -

My Friend - E ball de na.. 

response - blank stare...

My Friend - are sunai nahi deta kya ball de again no response ...

My Friend screaming back at us - are to ball gheun baslay det nahi (he's not giving the ball back)

We - To? Kon to? (He who he?)

My Friend - Are to radto na jorat to lahan mulga (the same little one who cries loudly)

Boy  - Muze khelne loge kya? (will you allow me to play with u)

My Friend - in shock screaming back at us -  are to vichartoy mala khelayla ghenar ka? (he's asking will we allow him to play with us)

We - Chalel tyacha naav kay aahe?

My Friend - E tera naam kya hai?

Boy - Papiha

My friend - busted laughing and told us his name, we all started laughing. 

Finally we allowed him to play with us. He told us he has two hours off everyday and he can come and play with us we also didnt mind it coz he never complained even if we didnt allow him to bat. Over a period of time he told us many things about him which were shocking for us. Marwadi had got him from his village and Papiha's parents had taken loan from him and since they were unable to pay it back & this little boy of 10-12 years was working here free of cost. As his salary was a part of repayment process and this boy was working just for twice a day sabji roti. We asked him how could he? the answer was , "are gaon mein to ye bhi nahi milta". We asked him why he cries so loudly his reply was agar mein jor se rounga nahi to aur marenge, as per his logic his further beating was prevented by his loud crying. 

Me and my friends innocently asked our parents can we take him to school with us which was curtly rejected by our parents. All these things continued for a while his seniors in kitchen stopped paying any heeds to his loud crying and his beating increased, our schools had resumed and playing time with "Papiha" reduced drastically. Once Papiha told us "mein idhar se bhag jaunga" ("I will run away from this place') we asked him will he go back to his village he replied "nahin udhar khana nahi milta aur baap marega karja nahi bharoonga to" (no i won't get food there and my father will beat me up for not repaying loan") We all laughed about it because we all thought it was impossible to sustain without parents or any support system (in his case that kitchen was his support system) and did not pay attention to whatever he said. 

One day none of us saw Papiha in kitchen nor did we hear his crying. We inquired with the kitchen staff they told us he was shifted to other shop's kitchen as one of the worker there had gone back to village and will be back next week. But he never came back we again inquired about him this time we were told "Papiha" escaped from this "Marwadi Sheth's" kitchen  and did not even go back to his own village his parents were also searching him. 

Papiha actually did what he told us, he just vanished from the kitchen without saying goodbye to us or telling us his probable whereabouts. He vanished from the scene as if he was never there...