21

The watch on his wrist read 5:45am. With uncertain steps Amit made his way towards the Govindnagar bus stop. It was his first day at work. Midas, a medium scale unit in the MIDC area, had hired Amit. It was 10 kilometers from the Govindnagar slums where Amit lived with his mother. She had given him the Hanuman Chalisa and asked him to keep it with him at all times. Amit was still in two minds about accepting the job. He felt the Chalisa in his shirt pocket looking for help and went on.
When Amit had shown his mother the appointment letter she had been ecstatic. She had distributed pedas to everybody in the chawl. “Don’t forget to give Ramesh the pedas. Why don’t you bring him over for dinner once? I haven’t met him as yet”. “ I don’t know when I’ll meet him.” he had replied. There was a certain amount of sadness in his tone but his mother was too happy to notice that. It took Amit some time to decide at what time to leave and which bus to take. He was surprised why this took so much thinking. However he laughed it off and settled for the 6:15 am bus.
He reached the bus stop at 6am. Surprisingly there was no one around but for some policemen who had been stationed there since Friday. Though this bus stop was his own backyard he had never been there so early. He instinctively went and sat at the second seat from the right and casually glanced to his left. There he saw scribbled on the wall in his own handwriting the words “ AMIT JAI AUR RAMESH VEERU”. Looking at those words the wounds he was trying to heal deepened, the memories he was trying to forget came back in a torrent and even the feel of the Chalisa couldn’t help him. Tears trickled down his cheeks.
Amit though surrounded by a group of boys from his chawl always seemed to be alone. He had no one he could call a friend; that was three months ago. Sitting at the bus stop looking somewhere at a distance with tears in his eyes he tried to remember where he had first met Ramesh. It was near this very bus stop on that Sunday of September. He couldn’t remember the date. All he could recollect was that it was rainy heavily. Amit was returning from the college when he saw a crowd in the middle of the street. He went and joined in. It didn’t take him much time to realize that an accident had taken place. He forced his way through the crowd and came to the fore. A man around his age was lying unconscious on the road and blood was trickling from the back of his head. A few paces ahead were the mangled remains of a motorcycle. Amit lurched forward and tried to lift the victim. Even moving him an inch seemed to be a Herculean effort. He looked around pleadingly. Some people reached out with a helping hand although reluctantly. “Remember lad we didn’t help u do this OK!!”, said one. Amit acknowledged and together they heaved the unmoving mass into a nearby rickshaw.
The man was Ramesh. He was admitted for a week in the hospital. The police closed the case as just another ‘hit and run’ incident with the last words in their report being ‘investigations pending’. During the course of the week Amit made it a point to be with Ramesh. Ramesh had come to the city a few weeks back and had no relations. After he was discharged from the hospital Ramesh would meet Amit daily in the evening at their adda- Govindnagar bus stop. The words that Amit saw now where scribbled on their birthday, 6th October.
One thing, which Amit always noticed in their conversations, was that Ramesh was never short of money and that he evaded any questions regarding his job and his family background. Amit once voiced his concern of getting a job to support his mother who was working as a domestic help. “Ill see what I can do about it, in the meantime keep this”, said Ramesh forwarding a bundle of Rs.50 notes. Amit accepted it after much coaxing and promised to return the money at the earliest.
Around 6:15am a crowd started building at the Govindnagar bus stop. There were school children, a newspaper vendor some office goers and a few boys just loitering around. Amit didn’t notice anything. He had buried his face in the palms of his hands and all he could hear were the horns honking on the day when he had met Ramesh the last time. Was it a week ago or was it yesterday he was not sure.
That day Ramesh looked nervous. It seemed he had come there to observe something and not to meet Amit. Amit did question him about this but Ramesh ignored the question altogether and handed him an envelope. “Its an appointment letter. You start your job next Monday and the pay is also decent Rs. 5000”, said Ramesh forcing his lips to take up the shape of a smile. Amit couldn’t believe when he opened the letter and read it. He was dumb founded. He didn’t say thank you but his eyes had conveyed all his feelings. “Look, today I am in a hurry. Go to go outta town for a week or so. When I’ll come back in the city Ill come to your house directly to take the pedas. Jara extra lake rakna. Bye buddy take care”. Saying this Ramesh started his motorbike and made his way through the traffic. Amit just looked at the speeding bike and waved his hand clutching the letter in his other. “Ill wait for your return friend.” He said to himself.
The next two days Amit was on a high. All his problems seemed to have been solved. Ramesh had taken an iconic status in his mind. “A true God sent angel”, his mother had said.
Then on Friday an incident shock the Govindnagar slums. An explosion had ripped a bus at the bus stop claiming 10 lives and injuring 20 others. Amit had rushed to the scene and immediately started helping the injured together with the emergency teams and people from the slums. While looking at the injured he could not help but think about Ramesh. Investigations started in the slums and some people were rounded off by the police but were later released. On Saturday the newspapers claimed that the explosion was an act of terror, the handiwork of terrorists and that the police were getting close to the mastermind behind the act. There were heated discussions about the incident and various conclusions were drawn. The area around the bus stop was teeming with khaki clad policemen. Though everything seemed to be normal people all over were thinking twice before boarding a bus and a look of apprehension was writ on their faces.
Sunday morning was a bit brighter for Amit than for others. Though the explosion was fresh in his mind, he had a big day before him tomorrow. Thinking of his first day and of Ramesh he unfolded the bulky Sunday edition of the newspaper. He gave out a cry just seconds after he had set his eyes on the headline. There written in bold letters were the words ‘THE MASTERMIND NABBED; CONFESSES THE CRIME’ and below these words were a close up of Iqbal- the mastermind. The face was emotionless and so were the eyes. Everything other than the photograph started dissolving in front of Amit’s eyes. “That’s not Iqbal that’s Ramesh.” he screamed. He flung the newspaper. He became numb, all that money that evasiveness when questioned about his family and his job started coming back to him. He realized Ramesh’s nervousness on their last meeting. He was there for a last look at his battlefield. Things started spinning around Amit. He leaned on a cupboard for support and caught sight of the letter resting on the table nearby. He wanted to tear that piece of shit. But then the image of his mother came before his eyes. How could he explain all this to his mother? He needed the job. He slumped in the chair when his mother entered with the pedas. He couldn’t muster the courage to tell her the truth about Ramesh ‘the God sent angel’. She didn’t deserve all this after all the hardships she’d been through all her life. So Amit just played along never making her realize that something was amiss.
The traffic now more than a trickle and the crowd at the bus stop had become sizeable. Amit looked at the dust, which the passing traffic was working up. “You OK mister?” enquired the policeman who seemed to have nothing on his mind. He nodded and smiled. “Has the 21 arrived?” he enquired in as casual a tone as was possible of him. Before the policeman could react he said looking away, “I am sorry I forgot.”
The watch on his wrist read 8am when Amit entered his house. His eyes were red and he looked as if he would collapse anytime. “What happened? Are you all right?” asked his mother worriedly. “He blew up the 21,” was all he could manage.