Indra’s Drishtikona (Viewpoint)

Album and Autobiography-1

Posted : January 10, 2010 at 6:54 am [IST]

Coming from a very remote village in Bihar, I came to know about photography pretty late. But when I was looking back in my old collection, I was really happy to see some photographs of those who brought me up. My grandfather, a teacher by profession was very ambitious. All the photographs of the earliest time are from his collection.

Perhaps the oldest photograph is one that has my grandfather and his aunty whom we all called ’sadhuain aaji’. It was taken in Ganga Sagar Mela. As per the beliefs among Hindus, one must visit Ganga Sagar once every January 14, the Makar Sankranti. We also went once, with Singh (BP and Kamkhya) family and in madly crowd I lost my camera. http://www.bangalinet.com/makarsankranti.htm

My great grandmother was a child-widow and a great soul. As I remember, she always took my side and loved me the most. It might be as I was the eldest of the next generation for her. Both, my grandfather who worked in Birlapur and his younger brother who ran the affairs of the landed property of the family in village respected her the most. She laid a very simple, religious life and spent most of her time in worship and rituals. Till she remained, no one could enter kitchen without taking bath. As I remember she was respected and consulted in everything concerning the family members. She specially took care of the milk management in the house after my younger grandfather brought it in after milking the cattle at home. She also used to make sweets on special occasions of festivals. She was also very good in singing the folk songs for all occasions, be the birth of a child or marriage, and was sought after by other families of our clan in the village. She had visited many religious places including Badrinath, Jagannathh Puri and Rameswaram. As it seems she came to Birlapur and went to Ganga Sagar for a bath on the holy confluence of Ganga and Bay of Bengal on Makar Sankranti with my grandfather. It was the same great grandmother who accompanied me and my uncle to Birlapur when we first came there for schooling, as there was no facility in the village at that time.

In the second photograph, I am with my grandfather and grandmother with whom I spent my childhood most. My mother went to live in her village Bodarhi, after the death of my maternal grandmother, the only lady in the house. But for the first time, my grandfather brought the great grandmother to look after us- myself and my youngest uncle who was two or three years older than me. We were in Birlapur at the time of the country’s independence, and have some experience of the communal riots. But then we returned back after few months to our village. One Shri Ganga Dayal Pandey had come to our village as school teacher. My grandfather found him pretty good and entrusted our education responsibility to him. I lived and had schooling in the village for some time. My grandfather again took me to Birlapur. Two of my uncles were there. One who was the son of my younger grandfather was studying, but the other uncle was brought by my grandfather to start a milk business. My grandfather managed to put me in class IV. I attended school without getting formal admission. But I went back again to village. The business of milk failed. It was again in 1950 that I along with my youngest uncle who was married by that time came to Birlapur for schooling. This time my grandmother accompanied us. And thereafter my grandmother remained in Birlapur all along. We started regular schooling from class VI. My grandfather was very smart at social networking. I remember he once got a petty labour contractor cum business man of Bihar who had a huge real estate in Budge Budge donate Rs 10,000 to Dr. Rajendra Prasad, the then President of India in a function in Mahajati Sadan, Calcutta. He had got the photograph above done by a professional. One can see the covering at back to make it appear decent. I remember there was an earlier photograph of mine with him, but it is no more traceable.

It is interesting to walk down the memory lane and the photographs assist to visualize the occasion and context.

- Indra

Category: Personal |