Weeping

Shankar is weeping!  What? Is  it true? Impossible!  He never cries. Ever since his imprisonment he never cried. He  came to this jail in a Missing Person case one year back. As a minor he is confined in the female ward. Nobody has ever found him sobbing. Rather the inmates always see him playing, dancing, singing or chatting with others. Shankar is in fact a child full of life and laughter. Most of the prisoners love him and enjoy his company. No one saw him crying ever or even with a sad face.

During his first week in prison, he was severely beaten by the warder with her bamboo stick. Shankar did not shed a drop of tear. He faced the punishment with a defying attitude and brave look. On that day all inmates had received a very small quantity of 'moori' (puffed rice) as their breakfast. For lunch they have one 'dabbu' (a big spoon) of rice, one dabbu watery liquid dal and one dabbu curry of bitter gourd with full of insects. Shankar was so hungry that he asked for one more dabbu of rice.The head matron of the jail ordered the warder in charge to provide a good lesson to her naive young charge. At night his whole body was swollen and red due to the severe beating. In spite tremendous pain, six year old boy did not utter any sound or shed a drop of tear. He bore all the pain silently, only the corners of his lips twitched.

Now such a brave boy is sobbing, resting his head in between his knees.Naturally all the inmates are astonished and concerned . The child who has not been a little bit nervous or upset, when he had lost his way to his little hut in 'Mana' refugee colony, where he used to live with his younger brother and widow mother.

Thousand of penniless  refugees  from East Bengal are rehabilitated in various refugee camps. The government established a school for the children. Each child who attends the school, receives 150 gram rice and two potatoes as dole everyday. In case of absence for whatever reason, there is no dole. These wretched people live from hand to mouth on what ever odd job are available. The children begged on streets after school hours. They have to share the burden along with their adults. Shankar was one of them. He bore this miserable life without any complaint. One day he lost his contact with friends while they were all  out begging in a train. Shankar got down in an unknown station. He told his problem in details to the railway police and asked how to get back to Mana refugee camp. He was deposited to local police station by rail police. He was transferred from one police station to another, then produced in one SDJM court. At last Shankar was sent to Presidency jail as a victim of missing person case.

His first impression of that horrible place is that of  a hell where all inmates are suffering like caged animals. Still not a drop of water came out from his eyes, he accepted everything  with a iron spirit. No one found tears in his eyes ever. Rather all the people are used to hear his laughter and talking like burbling of a hilly brook.

 He is a favourite of  all the prisoners. He  always offers his assistance to any of his inmates, with his small hands and large glowing eyes. He sings to them different songs of his past village life, narrates stories of his  experience in refugee camp and of his life as a beggar. He always tries either to help and entertain his co-prisoners. Most of the inmates love him and enjoy his songs and stories, which are like some fresh breeze in their stale life.

Nobody ever saw his sad face or tears in his eyes. In fact his tears  turned into stone in his very early childhood, either on the day when he found  his father, his relatives and his neighbours killed in a communal riot, or on that day when his sick mother fled away with him and his newly born baby brother, or while suffering from hunger while hearing the continuous crying of his little brother and lamentations of his mother. He has been uprooted again and again for many reasons in his life. Abject poverty and helplessness dried up all his tears. Extreme misery at such  a tender age had created a numbness in face of  any sorrow. In fact he has forgotten to cry.

Now these abundant  tears are

coming down from his eyes and soaked his shirt. Why? What's the cause? All the elder inmates are surrounded him to know the cause. After a long time Shankar burst out, "I have been locked up here for such a long time. I can eat here, what ever it may be. But  my mother and little brother are starving... I am not going to colony school, so can not collect the dole  .... not even  able to beg .... How are they surviving ?.... "Are they even alive now? .....Both of them were so sickly..... Who is looking after them?.....What has happened to them ! "


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