When Bal Gangadhar was 15 years of age he was forced to marry a girl child named Tapi of a nearby village. The alliance was arranged by the elders. At that time his father, Gangadhar Pant was sick and was bedridden.
The child marriages were order of the day during that period, a tradition in orthodox families that could not be broken. The children were too young to understand the implications of the childhood marriages. They were just helpless before the orthodox traditionalist elders.
The child marriage was infact not an ancient custom. It started when the foreign invaders flooded the country especially the Muslim invaders who followed no rule or code. One of their prize targets were women or girls of beautiful type whom they used to take forcibly. So, no pretty or young face was safe during the period. But strangely those invaders left married women alone as it was a grave sin according to Islamic tenets. So, to save the honour of their daughters, the Hindu parents started marrying their daughters in the childhood. Being legally married the girl child was relatively safe from abduction and dishonour. But it became a tradition and the people continued the practice even when its usefulness was over. That is one of the tragedies of Indians, of being blindly slavish to customs.
So, in the case of Bal Gangadhar and Tapi the marriage was merely some function in which they found themselves strangely the centre of all the activities and the attention of the relatives. It was an exciting experience to see all the women in finery and precious jewelry. Menfolk were also dressed in their best. Tapi was helped by aunts to get bedecked like a princess. She couldn’t understand the reason but enjoyed it anyway.
The bride and the groom were made to go around the fire seven times.
Then, Tapi’s father picked her up in his arms and walked to a waiting palki. He carefully deposited her inside and kissed her forehead. He had tears in his eyes. Tapi wondered why? She had never seen tears in his eyes before. Then, mother zoomed in and hugged her sobbing. Aunts and sisters did the same. The womenfolk started crying. It made Tapi also cry although she knew not why all of them were crying. Then, four carriers carried the palki away to groom’s home.
She liked the house. It was freshly white washed and decorated with flowers and leaves. The floors had flowery designs. The women of the house looked excited and they fawned over Tapi who was being treated like a special guest. An adult woman had accompanied Tapi from their home as per the custom. She had travelled in the same palki as Tapi. And at this new house she kept hovering around Tapi all the time which made Tapi feel at home.
By now Bal Gangadhar was getting some idea that he had been married although he could not understand the full importance of it. Tapi and Bal felt happy whenever they were together. Bal liked the innocent moon like face of Tapi. The girl saw the pile of books in the room of Bal. She was overawed to see those books, note books and exercise copies. Bal could read so many books was a wonder for her. She felt very ashamed that she could not read or write. Another wonder was that she was still being treated as an honoured guest. That had never happened before. Whenever she went to other’s house she was always treated like another child. But something had changed, now.
Bal and Tapi liked each other but didn’t talk much. They didn’t know what to say to each other, or talk about what? The only meaningful talk was when Tapi asked about the books if they were really for the reading of Bal and could he really read? Tapi admitted that she was totally alien to reading and writing. During that period girls were rarely sent to school. Most of the people held the view that education was not for the girls and they should confine themselves to cooking, cleaning, knitting and making the husbands happy. Bal Gangadhar didn’t like it. He made Tapi promise that she would learn to read and write.
On the third day, Tapi returned to her parent’s house. Her life returned to the old routine. She busied herself in playing with her friends or doing household chores. She forgot her promise made to Bal that she would learn to read and write. Besides she was afraid that if she asked her mother to send her to the school all the women would laugh at her.
Now for her Bal was a boy with whom she was asked to go around the fire seven times.
Some sort of game that.
Sometimes she wondered what she would say about her promise if some day that boy ran into her? The time passed.
Once women folk were talking about Tapi and her future. Tapi happened to be listening to their talk. The women were saying that in some years Tapi would be a young lady and Bal Gangadhar would come to take her away.
Now Tapi was in panic. How would she face Bal Gangadhar without having learnt to read and write? Now the promise given to Bal loomed large. Tapi told her mother about it.
The mother listened to her daughter’s problem seriously. She didn’t want her Tapi to loose face before her husband. She made up her mind that if son-in-law wanted it, it shall be done. Arrangement was made for Tapi to learn the letters.
Meanwhile Bal Gangadhar was getting politically educated. Now he was understanding the British colonial rule over Indian more clearly. He could practically feel the sting of being a slave of the foreign rulers and how the whitemen were exploiting the natives. His friends also understood that sooner or later they would have to wage the battle of freedom.
The maturing minds of the boys realised that guns and the soldiers were not the only weapons in the British arsenal. There were many more factors in the play. The Englishmen were well educated. That was their real power. They could plan things and knew how to run the administration. Before Englishmen Hindustanis looked horribly inefficient, incompetent and bereft of ideas. And the Englishmen suffered from no social evils like untouchability, castism, widow burning, child marriages, blind faiths and dowry. That was the Englishman’s real power, the education.
As Bal grew up natural instincts of the basic kind also began to influence his mind. Now he remembered more about the girl who had followed him around the fire seven times like a pet.
A wish to meet her would haunt him. This desire became stronger whenever he saw women and young girls going about merrily chatting and giggling.
His classmates knew about Bal’s marriage. They would often tease him by calling him old married man which used to annoy him. Strangely he would remember Tapi before going to sleep and often saw her in his dreams as a grown up girl.
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